NCD900 port?

NCD900 port?

[Chip Coldwell]

I'm facing a ~$1K site license charge for NCD's NCBridge software for
their NC948 X Terminals, and since my site consists of exactly three
of these things that I bought for less than $250 each I'm balking a
bit.

The NC948 consists of a 165 MHz QED RM5231, S3 Savage4 graphics
controller, and an AMD PCnet NIC of some sort.  It doesn't seem like
there's anything in that set that Linux or XFree86 wouldn't be happy
to run.

To be completely explicit what I'm proposing is to run Linux on the X
Terminal (as opposed to the server that provides boot image, xdm,
etc.).  My question is: has anybody done it or does anybody know a
reason why it can't be done?

Chip

-- 
Charles  M. "Chip" Coldwell
"Turn on, log in, tune out"

Re: NCD900 port?

[Alan Cox]

On Iau, 2003-04-24 at 21:20, Chip Coldwell wrote:
> I'm facing a ~$1K site license charge for NCD's NCBridge software for
> their NC948 X Terminals, and since my site consists of exactly three
> of these things that I bought for less than $250 each I'm balking a
> bit

I would think it is perfectly doable given specifications. I'd bet NCD
are a pain about them. NCD also seem to use signed images and if their
bootloader uses signed images the challenge may be rather harder.

Next time buy thin client PC's 8), a diskless, fanless EPIA will
set you back about the same with display.

Re: NCD900 port?

[Chip Coldwell]

On Thu, 24 Apr 2003, Kevin D. Kissell wrote:
> 
> What PCI bridge is being used?  Galileo?

Good question.  Short answer: I don't know.  I'll pry off the hood
and take a peek at what's on the board, unless this is something that
shares a die with the CPU.

> I think it's probably doable, but if you want two reasons 
> why it might not be, I'd say they would be:
> 1) Undocumented/unsupported PCI or other interface
> 2) Not enough RAM

#1 is definitely a possible stumbling block, so my first task is to
identify the PCI bridge.  The box has 48 MB of RAM in it, which should
be enough for both a small RAM disk root filesystem (busybox?) and the
kernel; the rest could be NFS mounted.  I've converted old x86 PCs to
diskless X Terminals using exactly that trick.

Chip

-- 
Charles  M. "Chip" Coldwell
"Turn on, log in, tune out"

Re: NCD900 port?

[Kevin D. Kissell]

> I'm facing a ~$1K site license charge for NCD's NCBridge software for
> their NC948 X Terminals, and since my site consists of exactly three
> of these things that I bought for less than $250 each I'm balking a
> bit.
> 
> The NC948 consists of a 165 MHz QED RM5231, S3 Savage4 graphics
> controller, and an AMD PCnet NIC of some sort.  It doesn't seem like
> there's anything in that set that Linux or XFree86 wouldn't be happy
> to run.

What PCI bridge is being used?  Galileo?

> To be completely explicit what I'm proposing is to run Linux on the X
> Terminal (as opposed to the server that provides boot image, xdm,
> etc.).  My question is: has anybody done it or does anybody know a
> reason why it can't be done?

I think it's probably doable, but if you want two reasons 
why it might not be, I'd say they would be:
1) Undocumented/unsupported PCI or other interface
2) Not enough RAM

Re: NCD900 port?

[Kevin D. Kissell]

> I'm facing a ~$1K site license charge for NCD's NCBridge software for
> their NC948 X Terminals, and since my site consists of exactly three
> of these things that I bought for less than $250 each I'm balking a
> bit.
> 
> The NC948 consists of a 165 MHz QED RM5231, S3 Savage4 graphics
> controller, and an AMD PCnet NIC of some sort.  It doesn't seem like
> there's anything in that set that Linux or XFree86 wouldn't be happy
> to run.

What PCI bridge is being used?  Galileo?

> To be completely explicit what I'm proposing is to run Linux on the X
> Terminal (as opposed to the server that provides boot image, xdm,
> etc.).  My question is: has anybody done it or does anybody know a
> reason why it can't be done?

I think it's probably doable, but if you want two reasons 
why it might not be, I'd say they would be:
1) Undocumented/unsupported PCI or other interface
2) Not enough RAM

Re: NCD900 port?

[Chip Coldwell]

On Thu, 24 Apr 2003, Chip Coldwell wrote:

> On Thu, 24 Apr 2003, Kevin D. Kissell wrote:
> > 
> > What PCI bridge is being used?  Galileo?
> 
> Good question.  Short answer: I don't know.  I'll pry off the hood
> and take a peek at what's on the board, unless this is something that
> shares a die with the CPU.

It was easy to identify once I took off the cover.  The PCI bridge is
made by V3 Semiconductor (now a part of QuickLogic?), part number
V32OUSC-75LP (Rev. B1):

http://www.quicklogic.com/home.asp?PageID=235&sMenuID=126

Is this the one called "Galileo"?

There's also two RS-232 line drivers/receivers, MAX3185 made by Maxim
(now part of Dallas Semiconductor) and some nearby Samsung parts that
I suppose are probably UARTs (this thing has two serial ports).  I
would guess that getting something to come out on a serial console is
going to be my first step.

Digitally signed images and bootloaders that enforce them sounds
particularly nasty.  That's a show stopper for me, if it turns out to
be that way.

Chip

-- 
Charles  M. "Chip" Coldwell
"Turn on, log in, tune out"

Re: NCD900 port?

[Brad Parker]

"Kevin D. Kissell" wrote:
>> I'm facing a ~$1K site license charge for NCD's NCBridge software for
>> their NC948 X Terminals, and since my site consists of exactly three
>> of these things that I bought for less than $250 each I'm balking a
>> bit.
>> 
>> The NC948 consists of a 165 MHz QED RM5231, S3 Savage4 graphics
>> controller, and an AMD PCnet NIC of some sort.  It doesn't seem like
>> there's anything in that set that Linux or XFree86 wouldn't be happy
>> to run.
>
>What PCI bridge is being used?  Galileo?

It it's anything like the explora 450 you should be able to get it going.
(oh my, did *I* say that?)

The 450 has those same two chips with a ppc403.  I managed to hack my
way into their undocumented pci bridge enough to get linux booted and
the ethernet working.  I have yet to get the s3 working but that's only
because I can find a pdf for the chip anywhere.  I can certainly talk to
the s3 (as well as the pcmcia space).

why ncd refuses to give out some info on these platforms eludes me.  these
days they'd probably sell more if they ran linux.
 
-brad

Re: NCD900 port?

[Chip Coldwell]

On Thu, 24 Apr 2003, Brad Parker wrote:
> 
> It it's anything like the explora 450 you should be able to get it going.
> (oh my, did *I* say that?)
> 
> The 450 has those same two chips with a ppc403.  I managed to hack my
> way into their undocumented pci bridge enough to get linux booted and
> the ethernet working.  I have yet to get the s3 working but that's only
> because I can find a pdf for the chip anywhere.  I can certainly talk to
> the s3 (as well as the pcmcia space).

That's very interesting.  When you say you don't have the S3 working,
do you mean that you can't get a virtual terminal on the display or
that you can't get X Windows working?  If the former, do you use a
serial console?

The PCI bridge in the NC900 is documented, at least slightly (see my
earlier post for the link).

Chip

-- 
Charles  M. "Chip" Coldwell
"Turn on, log in, tune out"

Re: NCD900 port?

[Kevin D. Kissell]

> On Thu, 24 Apr 2003, Chip Coldwell wrote:
> 
> > On Thu, 24 Apr 2003, Kevin D. Kissell wrote:
> > > 
> > > What PCI bridge is being used?  Galileo?
> > 
> > Good question.  Short answer: I don't know.  I'll pry off the hood
> > and take a peek at what's on the board, unless this is something that
> > shares a die with the CPU.
> 
> It was easy to identify once I took off the cover.  The PCI bridge is
> made by V3 Semiconductor (now a part of QuickLogic?), part number
> V32OUSC-75LP (Rev. B1):
> 
> http://www.quicklogic.com/home.asp?PageID=235&sMenuID=126
> 
> Is this the one called "Galileo"?

No, Galileo is/was a different company.  So you may not be able
to recycle as much existing code as you might have otherwise, but 
at least you've got some documentation for it.

            Kevin K.

Re: NCD900 port?

[Kevin D. Kissell]

> On Thu, 24 Apr 2003, Chip Coldwell wrote:
> 
> > On Thu, 24 Apr 2003, Kevin D. Kissell wrote:
> > > 
> > > What PCI bridge is being used?  Galileo?
> > 
> > Good question.  Short answer: I don't know.  I'll pry off the hood
> > and take a peek at what's on the board, unless this is something that
> > shares a die with the CPU.
> 
> It was easy to identify once I took off the cover.  The PCI bridge is
> made by V3 Semiconductor (now a part of QuickLogic?), part number
> V32OUSC-75LP (Rev. B1):
> 
> http://www.quicklogic.com/home.asp?PageID=235&sMenuID=126
> 
> Is this the one called "Galileo"?

No, Galileo is/was a different company.  So you may not be able
to recycle as much existing code as you might have otherwise, but 
at least you've got some documentation for it.

            Kevin K.

Re: NCD900 port?

[Sander Wichers]

After a quick look in google I found the following page for you. (you were
very close) It actually contains linux sources for the V320USC and the QED
RM5231.
http://www.quicklogic.com/home.asp?menuID=110&PageID=253

good luck,

Sander

Re: NCD900 port?

[Sander Wichers]

After a quick look in google I found the following page for you. (you were
very close) It actually contains linux sources for the V320USC and the QED
RM5231.
http://www.quicklogic.com/home.asp?menuID=110&PageID=253

good luck,

Sander

Re: NCD900 port?

[Dan Aizenstros]

Hello Chip,

The V320USC is fully documented and manuals are
available if you want them. The QuickLogic web site
is a bit out of date with respect to the Linux support.
I am tracking the linux-mips CVS tree and I can send
you a patch sometime next week. However, the patch will
be for our Hurricane board and so you will have to make
changes to support the NCD device.

Can you provide any information about the bootloader?
Does it support loading of ELF images?

Also, do you know what endian the machine is using.
The Linux port is mostly tested little endian and
may need some work to get big endian going.

Regards,

Dan Aizenstros

>>> Chip Coldwell <coldwell@frank.harvard.edu> 04/24/03 15:51 PM >>>
On Thu, 24 Apr 2003, Chip Coldwell wrote:

> On Thu, 24 Apr 2003, Kevin D. Kissell wrote:
> > 
> > What PCI bridge is being used?  Galileo?
> 
> Good question.  Short answer: I don't know.  I'll pry off the hood
> and take a peek at what's on the board, unless this is something that
> shares a die with the CPU.

It was easy to identify once I took off the cover.  The PCI bridge is
made by V3 Semiconductor (now a part of QuickLogic?), part number
V32OUSC-75LP (Rev. B1):

http://www.quicklogic.com/home.asp?PageID=235&sMenuID=126

Is this the one called "Galileo"?

There's also two RS-232 line drivers/receivers, MAX3185 made by Maxim
(now part of Dallas Semiconductor) and some nearby Samsung parts that
I suppose are probably UARTs (this thing has two serial ports).  I
would guess that getting something to come out on a serial console is
going to be my first step.

Digitally signed images and bootloaders that enforce them sounds
particularly nasty.  That's a show topper for me, if it turns out to
be that way.

Chip

-- 
Charles  M. "Chip" Coldwell
"Turn on, log in, tune out"

Re: NCD900 port?

[Dan Aizenstros]

Hello Chip,

The V320USC is fully documented and manuals are
available if you want them. The QuickLogic web site
is a bit out of date with respect to the Linux support.
I am tracking the linux-mips CVS tree and I can send
you a patch sometime next week. However, the patch will
be for our Hurricane board and so you will have to make
changes to support the NCD device.

Can you provide any information about the bootloader?
Does it support loading of ELF images?

Also, do you know what endian the machine is using.
The Linux port is mostly tested little endian and
may need some work to get big endian going.

Regards,

Dan Aizenstros

>>> Chip Coldwell <coldwell@frank.harvard.edu> 04/24/03 15:51 PM >>>
On Thu, 24 Apr 2003, Chip Coldwell wrote:

> On Thu, 24 Apr 2003, Kevin D. Kissell wrote:
> > 
> > What PCI bridge is being used?  Galileo?
> 
> Good question.  Short answer: I don't know.  I'll pry off the hood
> and take a peek at what's on the board, unless this is something that
> shares a die with the CPU.

It was easy to identify once I took off the cover.  The PCI bridge is
made by V3 Semiconductor (now a part of QuickLogic?), part number
V32OUSC-75LP (Rev. B1):

http://www.quicklogic.com/home.asp?PageID=235&sMenuID=126

Is this the one called "Galileo"?

There's also two RS-232 line drivers/receivers, MAX3185 made by Maxim
(now part of Dallas Semiconductor) and some nearby Samsung parts that
I suppose are probably UARTs (this thing has two serial ports).  I
would guess that getting something to come out on a serial console is
going to be my first step.

Digitally signed images and bootloaders that enforce them sounds
particularly nasty.  That's a show topper for me, if it turns out to
be that way.

Chip

-- 
Charles  M. "Chip" Coldwell
"Turn on, log in, tune out"

Re: NCD900 port?

[Chip Coldwell]

On Fri, 25 Apr 2003, Dan Aizenstros wrote:
> 
> The V320USC is fully documented and manuals are
> available if you want them. The QuickLogic web site
> is a bit out of date with respect to the Linux support.
> I am tracking the linux-mips CVS tree and I can send
> you a patch sometime next week. However, the patch will
> be for our Hurricane board and so you will have to make
> changes to support the NCD device.

I found the documentation on line; it looks very thorough.  I also
found the (little-endian) toolchain on your website, which is very
convenient.

The first big stumbling block will be to guess the base address where
the bridge is located.  I see in your Hurricane board it's found at
0xBC000000; is there any reason to hope that NCD would locate it in
the same place or is this pretty much an arbitrary decision?

> Can you provide any information about the bootloader?
> Does it support loading of ELF images?

I really don't know.  If it doesn't, I suppose could give it a
compressed kernel image.  Or would this require some monkeying around
with head.S?

> Also, do you know what endian the machine is using.
> The Linux port is mostly tested little endian and
> may need some work to get big endian going.

That I don't know.  If I had to guess I would say big-endian just
because of the cultural background that NCD comes from.

I'm going to do some experiments over the weekend and try to come up
with some answers to these questions.

Chip

-- 
Charles  M. "Chip" Coldwell
"Turn on, log in, tune out"

Re: NCD900 port?

[Chip Coldwell]

On Fri, 25 Apr 2003, Dan Aizenstros wrote:
> 
> The V320USC is fully documented and manuals are
> available if you want them. The QuickLogic web site
> is a bit out of date with respect to the Linux support.
> I am tracking the linux-mips CVS tree and I can send
> you a patch sometime next week. However, the patch will
> be for our Hurricane board and so you will have to make
> changes to support the NCD device.

I found the documentation on line; it looks very thorough.  I also
found the (little-endian) toolchain on your website, which is very
convenient.

The first big stumbling block will be to guess the base address where
the bridge is located.  I see in your Hurricane board it's found at
0xBC000000; is there any reason to hope that NCD would locate it in
the same place or is this pretty much an arbitrary decision?

> Can you provide any information about the bootloader?
> Does it support loading of ELF images?

I really don't know.  If it doesn't, I suppose could give it a
compressed kernel image.  Or would this require some monkeying around
with head.S?

> Also, do you know what endian the machine is using.
> The Linux port is mostly tested little endian and
> may need some work to get big endian going.

That I don't know.  If I had to guess I would say big-endian just
because of the cultural background that NCD comes from.

I'm going to do some experiments over the weekend and try to come up
with some answers to these questions.

Chip

-- 
Charles  M. "Chip" Coldwell
"Turn on, log in, tune out"

Re: NCD900 port?

[Dan Aizenstros]

Hello Chip,

The V320USC has a boot EEPROM that is used to configure
it. If it is socketed on the board than I would suggest
you remove it and put it in a device programmer and dump
its contents. From the EEPROM contents you can find out
some of the memory map of the system.

You would be able to find out the base address of the
V320USC registers which do not have a fixed address and
could be located anywhere in the KSEG1 region.

You would be able to find out the base address of the
chips selects for the local bus.

Without a memory map from NCD you will probably have
to probe around to find the addresses of the devices
attached to the local bus.

You may have to write drivers for the devices attached
to the local bus.

Devices attached to the PCI bus will be easy to probe
using configuration cycles.

As for the bootloader, if it downloads binary images
than you need to know what start address is expects
so that you can compile linux to run from that address.
If it can download ELF or S3 records than it will
probably use the start address in the kernel image.
Do you get a bootloader prompt on startup? Or does
it just launch straight into X.

-- Dan A.

>>> Chip Coldwell <coldwell@frank.harvard.edu> 04/25/03 07:21 AM >>>
On Fri, 25 Apr 2003, Dan Aizenstros wrote:
> 
> The V320USC is fully documented and manuals are
> available if you want them. The QuickLogic web site
> is a bit out of date with respect to the Linux support.
> I am tracking the linux-mips CVS tree and I can send
> you a patch sometime next week. However, the patch will
> be for our Hurricane board and so you will have to make
> changes to support the NCD device.

I found the documentation on line; it looks very thorough. I also
found the (little-endian) toolchain on your website, which is very
convenient.

The first big stumbling block will be to guess the base address where
the bridge is located.  I see in your Hurricane board it's found at
0xBC000000; is there any reason to hope that NCD would locate it in
the same place or is this pretty much an arbitrary decision?

> Can you provide any information about the bootloader?
> Does it support loading of ELF images?

I really don't know.  If it doesn't, I suppose could give it a
compressed kernel image.  Or would this require some monkeying around
with head.S?

> Also, do you know what endian the machine is using.
> The Linux port is mostly tested little endian and
> may need some work to get big endian going.

That I don't know.  If I had to guess I would say big-endian just
because of the cultural background that NCD comes from.

I'm going to do some experiments over the weekend and try to come up
with some answers to these questions.

Chip

-- 
Charles  M. "Chip" Coldwell
"Turn on, log in, tune out"

Re: NCD900 port?

[Dan Aizenstros]

Hello Chip,

The V320USC has a boot EEPROM that is used to configure
it. If it is socketed on the board than I would suggest
you remove it and put it in a device programmer and dump
its contents. From the EEPROM contents you can find out
some of the memory map of the system.

You would be able to find out the base address of the
V320USC registers which do not have a fixed address and
could be located anywhere in the KSEG1 region.

You would be able to find out the base address of the
chips selects for the local bus.

Without a memory map from NCD you will probably have
to probe around to find the addresses of the devices
attached to the local bus.

You may have to write drivers for the devices attached
to the local bus.

Devices attached to the PCI bus will be easy to probe
using configuration cycles.

As for the bootloader, if it downloads binary images
than you need to know what start address is expects
so that you can compile linux to run from that address.
If it can download ELF or S3 records than it will
probably use the start address in the kernel image.
Do you get a bootloader prompt on startup? Or does
it just launch straight into X.

-- Dan A.

>>> Chip Coldwell <coldwell@frank.harvard.edu> 04/25/03 07:21 AM >>>
On Fri, 25 Apr 2003, Dan Aizenstros wrote:
> 
> The V320USC is fully documented and manuals are
> available if you want them. The QuickLogic web site
> is a bit out of date with respect to the Linux support.
> I am tracking the linux-mips CVS tree and I can send
> you a patch sometime next week. However, the patch will
> be for our Hurricane board and so you will have to make
> changes to support the NCD device.

I found the documentation on line; it looks very thorough. I also
found the (little-endian) toolchain on your website, which is very
convenient.

The first big stumbling block will be to guess the base address where
the bridge is located.  I see in your Hurricane board it's found at
0xBC000000; is there any reason to hope that NCD would locate it in
the same place or is this pretty much an arbitrary decision?

> Can you provide any information about the bootloader?
> Does it support loading of ELF images?

I really don't know.  If it doesn't, I suppose could give it a
compressed kernel image.  Or would this require some monkeying around
with head.S?

> Also, do you know what endian the machine is using.
> The Linux port is mostly tested little endian and
> may need some work to get big endian going.

That I don't know.  If I had to guess I would say big-endian just
because of the cultural background that NCD comes from.

I'm going to do some experiments over the weekend and try to come up
with some answers to these questions.

Chip

-- 
Charles  M. "Chip" Coldwell
"Turn on, log in, tune out"

Re: NCD900 port?

[Brad Parker]

Chip Coldwell wrote:
>On Thu, 24 Apr 2003, Brad Parker wrote:
>> 
>> It it's anything like the explora 450 you should be able to get it going.
>> (oh my, did *I* say that?)
>> 
>> The 450 has those same two chips with a ppc403.  I managed to hack my
>> way into their undocumented pci bridge enough to get linux booted and
>> the ethernet working.  I have yet to get the s3 working but that's only
>> because I can find a pdf for the chip anywhere.  I can certainly talk to
>> the s3 (as well as the pcmcia space).
>
>That's very interesting.  When you say you don't have the S3 working,
>do you mean that you can't get a virtual terminal on the display or
>that you can't get X Windows working?  If the former, do you use a
>serial console?

I mean I can't get the existing S3 driver to talk to it at all.  The existing
driver assumes it's running on a real pc and I can't figure out the mapping.

current I use a serial console.

I can see the S3's pci space through the bridge, but I can't figure out
how to change the existing driver to talk it.

-brad

Re: NCD900 port?

[Brad Parker]

Chip Coldwell wrote:
>
>> Can you provide any information about the bootloader?
>> Does it support loading of ELF images?
>
>I really don't know.  If it doesn't, I suppose could give it a
>compressed kernel image.  Or would this require some monkeying around
>with head.S?

On the 450 I had to make a slight change to head.S and I hacked a program
which fools around with the ELF header to get the NCD boot loader to 
be happy.  I got this program originally from Dan Malek - I think it 
was originally intended to wake an ELF header for a VXWorks boot loader
(which the ncd boot loader, on the 450 at least, appears to be)

the source is on sourceforge or I can email the interesting bits.

(http://explora-linux.sourceforge.net)

-brad