What's Firmware?

Firmware

In this context,"firmware" designates the content of the FPGA (Field Programmable Gate Array) device of a card.

It defines the functionality of the card including the PCI Express end-point.

Firmware EEPROM

The FPGA used on Coaxlink and Grablink Duo frame grabbers is RAM-based; it needs to be loaded every power up.

Considering that a PCI Express end point must be ready within 150 milliseconds of the power-up time, the FPGA content, must be loaded quickly after having applied power to the card. Therefore, the firmware is stored into a non-volatile flash EEPROM allowing a fast start-up of the FPGA.

This situation differs from other Euresys products, such as MultiCam cards, where the FPGA content is loaded by the MultiCam driver when it starts or at any time if a FPGA configuration change is requested during operation.

The eGrabber driver will never modify the content of the FPGA during operation.

Firmware modifications

Any modification of the FPGA content requires a two-step operation:

1.

The new firmware is written into the Flash EEPROM of the card using a firmware management tool.

2.

The new firmware is activated by cycling the system power.