IDT EB4T4 Eval Board, Manual

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Notes
EB4T4 Eval Board Manual 3 - 1 August 20, 2007
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Chapter 3
Software for the EB4T4 Eval Board
Introduction
This chapter discusses some of the main features of the available software to give users a better under-
standing of what can be achieved with the EB4T4 evaluation board using the device management software.
Device management software and related user documentation are available on a CD which is included
in the Evaluation Board Kit. This information is also available on IDT’s FTP site. For more information,
contact IDT at
ssdhelp@idt.com .
Device Management Software
The primary use of the Device Management Software package is to enable users of the evaluation
board to access all the registers in the PES4T4 device. This access can be achieved using the PCI Express
in-band configuration cycles through the upstream port on the PES4T4.
This software also enables users to save a snapshot of the current register set into a dump file which
can be used for debugging purposes. An export/import facility is also available to create and use “Configu-
ration” files which can be used to initialize the switch device with specific values in specific registers.
A conversion utility is also provided to translate a configuration file into an EEPROM programmable data
structure. This enables the user to program an appropriate serial EEPROM with desirable register settings
for the PES4T4, and then to populate that EEPROM onto the Evaluation Board. It is also possible to
program the EEPROM directly on the Evaluation Board using a feature provided by the software package.
The front end of the Device Management Software is a user-friendly Graphical User Interface which
allows the user to quickly read or write the registers of interest. The GUI also permits the user to run the
software in “simulation” mode with no real hardware attached, allowing the creation of configuration files for
the PES4T4 in the absence of the actual device.
Much of the Device Management Software is written with device-independent and OS-independent
code. The software will be guaranteed to work on Linux (/sys interface) and MS Windows XP. It may func-
tion flawlessly on various flavors of MS Windows, but may not be validated on all. The fact that the software
is device-independent assures its scalability to future PCIe parts from IDT. Once users are familiar with the
GUI, they will be able to use the same GUI on all PCIe parts from IDT. This software is customized for each
device through an XML device description file which includes information on the number of ports, registers,
types of registers, information on bit-fields within each register, etc.