NVIDIA TEGRA 250 DEVELOPER KIT HARDWARE...

NVIDIA TEGRA 250 DEVELOPER KIT HARDWARE

INTRODUCTION AND SETUP

SEMINAR REPORT

Submitted by

BINIT KUMAR

in partial fulfillment for the award of the degree

of

BACHELOR OF TECHNOLOGYin

COMPUTER SCIENCE & ENGINEERING

SCHOOL OF ENGINEERING

COCHIN UNIVERSITY OF SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

KOCHI-682022

OCTOBER-2010

Division of Computer EngineeringSchool of Engineering

Cochin University of Science & TechnologyKochi-682022

CERTIFICATE

Certified that this is a bonafied record of the seminar work titled

NVIDIA TEGRA 250 DEVELOPER KITHARDWARE INTRODUCTION AND SETUP

Done by

BINIT KUMAR

of VII semester Computer Science & Engineering in the year 2010 in partial fulfillment of the

requirements for the award of Degree of Bachelor of Technology in Computer Science &

Engineering of Cochin University of Science & Technology

Dr.David Peter S Mr. Vinod Kumar

Head of the Division Seminar Guide

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

We take this occasion to thank God, Almighty for blessing us with his grace

and taking our endeavor to a successful culmination. We extend our sincere

and heartfelt thanks to our esteemed guide, Mr. Vinod Kumar for providing

us with the right guidance and advice at the crucial junctures and for

showing us the right way. We extend our sincere thanks to our respected

head of the division Dr. David Peter , for allowing us to use the facilities

available. We would also like to thank the our class co-ordinator Mr.

Sudheep Elayidom for his kind suggestion towards the initiative of this

seminar.We would like to thank the other faculty members also,at this

occasion. Last but not least we would like to thank friends for the support

and encouragement they have given us during the course of our work.

BINIT KUMAR

ABSTRACT

NVIDIA Tegra is a system-on-a-chip series developed by NVIDIA for

mobile devices such as smart phones, personal digital assistants and

mobile internet devices. Each Tegra is a "computer on a chip" which

integrates the ARM architecture processor CPU, GPU, north bridge, south

bridge and memory controller onto a single package. The series

emphasizes low power consumption and high performance for playing

video and audio. The series is classified into three parts –APX series, 6xx

series and 2xx series . The first product of 2xx series is TEGRA 250 .

Here ,the initial setup of Nvidia Tegra 250 Development kit is focused

.This is designed to assist a new user in understanding the hardware ,

selecting an operating system to install to the devkit , and connect and

configure the hardware to boot that operating system .

i

TABLE OF CONTENTS

CHAPTER NO. TITLE PAGE NO.

ABSTRACT i

LIST OF SYMBOLS ii

LIST OF FIGURES iii

1. INTRODUCTION 1

2. OVERVIEW 4

2.1 UNBOXING 4

2.2 HOST PC CONFIGURATION 4

2.3 CONNECTING THE DEVKIT HW 4

2.4 INSTALLING THE OS TO THEDEVKIT

5

3. UNBOXING 6

3.1 DEVKIT CONTENTS AND HWREQUIREMENTS

6

3.2 GETTING FAMILIAR TO DEVKIT 7

3.2.1 MAIN BOARD 7

3.2.2 MINI SATELLITE BOARD 9

4. CONNECTING THE MINISATELLITE BOARD

11

5. HOST PC CONFIGURATION 13

5.1 SELECTING ANDDOWNLOADING A PLATFORMSUPPORT PACK

13

6. CONNECTING THE DEVKIT HW 15

7. INSTALLING OS IMAGES ONTOTHE DEVKIT

18

7.1 PLACING THE DEVKIT INTORECOVERY MODE

18

7.2 RECOVERY MODE HOST PC OSBDRIVER

22

8. USING THE BOOTED DEVKIT 25

9. CONCLUSION 26

REFERENCES 27

ii

LIST OF SYMBOLS AND ABBREVATIONSSOE SCHOOL OF ENGINEERING

DEVKIT DEVELOPER KIT

SOC SYSTEM ON A CHIP

COB COMPUTER ON A BOARD

MB MEGA BYTE

GB GIGA BYTE

CPU CENTRAL PROCESSING UNIT

ARM ADVANCED RISC MACHINE

HD HIGH DEFINITION

USB UNIVERSAL SERIAL BUS

HDMI HIGH DEFINITION MULTIMEDIA INTERFACE

DVI DIGITAL VISUAL INTERFACE

VGA VIDEO GRAPHICS ARRAY

CRT CATHODE RAY TUBE

SD SECURE DIGITAL

BATT BATTERY

OS OPERATING SYSTEM

PC PERSONAL COMPUTER

LED LIGHT EMITTING DIODE

CUSAT COCHIN UNIVERSITY OF SCIENCE AND

TECHNOLOGY

iii

LIST OF FIGURES

1.1 Developer kit Tegra 250 3

3.1 Main board 7

3.2 Mini satellite board 9

4.1 Connecting the lower ribbon 11

4.2 Connecting the upper ribbon 12

7.1 Powering on the device 19

7.2 Pressing recovery button 19

7.3 Pressing reset button 20

7.4 Releasing the reset button 21

7.5 Releasing the recovery button 21

7.6 Window logo testing prompt 23

7.7 Device manager 24

Nvidia Tegra 250 Development Kit Hardware Introduction and Setup

Division of Computer engineering SOE ,CUSAT 1

CHAPTER-1INTRODUCTION

This chapter provides an introduction about the NVIDIA TEGRA 250

processor.

NVIDIA Tegra is a system-on-a-chip series developed by NVIDIA for

mobile devices such as smart phones, personal digital assistants and mobile

internet devices. Each Tegra is a "computer on a chip" which integrates the ARM

architecture processor CPU, GPU, northbridge, southbridge and memory

controller onto a single package. The series emphasizes low power consumption

and high performance for playing video and audio.The series is classified into

three parts –APX series, 6xx series and 2xx series . The first product of 2xx

series is TEGRA 250 .It has the following specifications :-

Processor: Dual-core ARM Cortex-A9 MPCore, up to 1 GHz

Graphics: double 3D graphics performance of Tegra 600 series

LP-DDR2 / DDR2

1080p H.264/VC-1/MPEG-4 Video Decode

1080p H.264 Video Encode

JPEG encode and decode

dual-display support

camera support

Here ,the initial setup of Nvidia Tegra 250 Development kit is focused

.This is designed to assist a new user in understanding the hardware , selecting an

operating system to install to the devkit , and connect and configure the hardware

to boot that operating system.



The developer kit contains almost all the necessary hardwares required

to install the particular OS and boot it to make use .This kit is a compact ,

smartbook-motherboard form factor computer-on-a-board with the following

specifications :

Dual ARM Cortex A9 CPU @1GHz

1GB of RAM

High-performance, shader-based 3D acceleration

HD video encode and decode

512MB of Flash memory

Onboard wired Ethernet

WiFi

Bluetooth

Analog stereo audio in/out

USB keyboard/mouse/storage support

HDMI/DVI-D and VGA/CRT display support

Onboard SD(HC) slot



Fig 1.1:Developer kit Tegra 250

The figure mentioned above is the Tegra 250 developer kit . All the

components are listed above . Mainly it contains main kit , mini satellite board

and power adapter . All other components are embedded onto these .



CHAPTER-2OVERVIEW

In this chapter all the basic steps that are required to begin developing for

the Tegra 250 are explained .The basic steps like unboxing ,host pc configuration

,connecting the devkit hardware and installing the operating system onto the

developer’s kit are explained.

There are a few basic steps required to begin developing for the devkit:

2.1 Unboxing:

Unpack the devkit components

Familiarize yourself with the components

2.2 Host PC Configuration:

Select the desired devkit operating system

Collect the support pack for that operating system (eg. download it

from the NVIDIA Tegra developers website )

Read the documentation provided with that support pack and install

it to the appropriate host PC

Install any host PC support SW as required by the platform support

pack’s documentation

2.3 Connecting the Devkit HW:

Locate the required hardware accessories for the devkit (somewhat

dependent upon the selected devkit operating system image)

Select the desired video output based on your available display

devices and the operating system image



2.4 Installing the Operating System to the Devkit:

Follow the operating system image installation instructions provided with

the support pack

Boot the devkit



CHAPTER-3UNBOXING

This chapter deals with what to do after receiving the Tegra 250 hardware

development kit . First developer kit contents and hardware requirements are

explained then those item that are required to be used by the developer kit and that

which are to be provided by the developers are explained .

3.1 Devkit Contents and Hardware Requirements

Initially , the developer kit contain the following items:

Devkit main board (rectangular circuit board containing the Tegra chip and

connectors for networking, USB peripherals, storage and display devices)

15V power adapter (USA 120V mains power connection)

Adjustable, folding, threaded WiFi antenna

Expansion board (smaller, square circuit board containing a serial port,

LEDs and a few buttons)

Items required to use the devkit, but not present in devkit :

Host PC with USB ports. The exact OS that this host PC must be running

may differ depending upon the devkit OS to be used, but is most frequently

Microsoft Windows.

USB mini (NOT micro, as with previous Tegra devkits) to USB cable (for

device setup and connectivity)

External display supporting VGA (15-pin D-Sub), HDMI or DVI (via

HDMI-to-DVI adapter)

SD card or USB-based “thumb drive” for additional storage

USB mouse



USB keyboard

Items provided by developer :

Powered USB hub

3.2 Getting familiar to developer kit :

3.2.1 Main BoardThe following diagram shows a Tegra 250 devkit main board with power

connected. Important connectors are annotated:

Fig 3.1 : main boardThe figure above shows the nvidia tegra 250 main board.

The annotated items include :-



15V Power jack. Supplies the main power to the devkit (the

devkit as shipped to developers does not directly support

battery power)

VGA (CRT) jack. Support for 15-pin D-Sub analog display output

HDMI jack. Support for digital display output

WiFi antenna jack. Connection point for supplied (or 3rd-party) WiFi

antenna

Tegra 250 chip. The heart and soul of the Tegra 250 devkit

USB-A jacks (3). Support for common peripherals (use of a

powered USB hub is strongly recommended)

Expansion board connectors. “Header” connections for an expansion

board (supplied) that adds status LEDs, copies of the power, reset

and recovery buttons, and a serial port.

“ACOK” configuration switch. A configuration micro-switch that is

used to adjust the power behavior of the devkit. In the left (BATT)

position, the AC adapter simulates a battery, and the soft power

button functions normally. In the right (NORM) position, applying

power causes the device to turn on, without pressing the power

button. The left (BATT) position is preferred for developers.

Power button. Pressing this switch will toggle the power to the

device on and off

Recovery (flashing) button. Used to place the devkit in a special

mode that leaves it ready to receive a new operating system image

via USB (“recovery” mode)

Reset button. Soft reset

Microphone jack. Stereo microphone input as a 1/8” phone jack



Headphone jack. Stereo headphone output as a 1/8” phone jack

Ethernet jack. Wired networking if supported by the OS

SD card slot. Supports normal and high-capacity SD card storage

USB-mini jack. USB jack for flashing the device (updating OS

images) and connecting the device to a host PC.

3.2.2 Mini Satellite Board

In addition, most Tegra 250 devkits include the “mini satellite board”,

which replicates the main power, reset and recovery buttons, adds a UART serial

port for low-level debugging on some OSes, and switches and LEDs for common

“smartbook” features like lid close, wifi on/off, etc.

Wifi switch

Fig 3.2 : Mini satellite board

The board pictured above is a mini satellite board of Tegra 250



developer kit hardware .

The annotated items are :

• UART serial port. Standard serial port for use with some OS images

for low-level logging and debugging

• Power, reset, recovery buttons. Replicated from the main board so that all

controls may be found on the satellite board. Useful if the main board is

somehow packaged

• Simulated lid switch. On some OS images, setting this switch causes the

device to sleep

• Dual ribbon cables. Connection to the main board

• Wifi, BT, etc status LEDs. Provides activity status of major peripherals

• WiFi switch. Enables/disables WiFi radio



CHAPTER-4CONNECTING THE MINI SATELLITE BOARD

This chapter deals with how the mini satellite board of Tegra 250

processor is connected with the Tegra main board provided with the developer kit

. If the OS image requires it, the mini satellite board can be connected to

the main board to add serial port and accessory switch functionalities. The mini

satellite board can be connected as follows:

Disconnect power to the main board!

Place the satellite board so that the pair of ribbon cables on the back edge of

the satellite board roughly match the pair of multi-pin headers on the front

edge of the main board

Connect the lower (shorter) ribbon cable to the frontmost header on the

main board as shown in the following figure. Be very careful to align the

pins. Minimal force should be required to insert the plug, and it should

insert symmetrically:

Fig 4.1 : Connecting the lower ribbon



The figure shows how the lower ribbon is connected with the frontmost

header of the main board of the Tegra 250 hardware development kit .

Connect the remaining (upper, longer) ribbon cable to the rearmost of the

two headers on the main board. Insertion should be similar to the previous

ribbon cable and should look like the following figure

Fig 4.2 : Connecting the upper ribbon

The figure shows how the upper longer ribbon is connected with the

rearmost header of the main board of the Tegra 250 hardware development kit .

Reconnect power to the main board. Assembly is complete.



CHAPTER-5HOST PC CONFIGURATION

This chapter deals with what are the configurations required to be in the

personal computer of the host . It explains which platform support pack is to be

selected and various ways of downloading them from the net.

5.1 Selecting and Downloading a Platform Support Pack

Currently, there are several packs available for use with the devkit,

including OS support packs and sample application SDKs. An OS support pack

must be installed (or “flashed”) to the devkit in order to boot it and use it. The set

of supported packs include:

An Android Éclair OS support pack. This includes scripts to install the

Android OS image and associated “getting started” documentation.

A Windows CE 6.0 OS support pack. This includes a script to install the

CE 6.0 operating system image onto a recovery-mode devkit as well as

Khronos headers and libraries to allow developers to use Microsoft Visual

Studio 2005 and 2008 to develop and debug applications on Tegra using

OpenGL ES, OpenMAX, OpenKODE, etc.

An Ubuntu-based Linux OS support pack.

These and other packs may be found on the Tegra developers’ website.

Developers should select the target operating system that best matches their

intended market, feature set and development environment requirements, as each

of these operating systems differ significantly on all of these fronts. The developer

website information for each OS support pack can assist in the decision. However,

OS images may be re-flashed to the devkit at will, so a single devkit can change



between operating systems in minutes.

Download the desired platform support pack for the OS you wish to

use. At this point, one should transition away from this documentation

temporarily and into the documentation supplied with the selected OS image.

That documentation will, as needed, provide pointers back to this manual when

it is time to connect and “flash” the device. Ensure that all of the selected OS

image’s host PC prerequisites are satisfied by your selected host PC before

continuing.



CHAPTER-6CONNECTING THE DEVELOPER KIT HARDWARE

This chapter deals with those items that must be connected to the Tegra

250 developer kit to install an operating system and boot the device .Items

common to all are discussed in this chapter .

While use-cases will differ, there are a few basic items that must be

connected to the devkit to install an operating system and boot the device. Items

common to all operating systems are focused here . Additional items such as serial

connections, network connections, and storage devices may be required to install

and boot some operating systems.

These will be documented along with the particular operating system.The

common requirements include:

Display connection. One of the following display devices should be

connected. For best results, do not connect more than one of these options

at a time unless directed to do so by a particular operating system pack. Be

sure to check the documentation for your selected OS support pack, as

some OSes may not support all of these display connections:

Analog “VGA” display (LCD or CRT monitor) connected via the

devkit’s VGA 15-pin D-sub connector.

HDMI display (LCD screen or compatible television) via the devkit’s

HDMI port and an HDMI cable. Note that on many OS images, using

HDMI as the display connection will route audio to the HDMI port as

well, disabling the headphone jack.

Digital DVI-D display connected via the devkit’s HDMI port and

an HDMI-to-DVI cable or cable-adapter pair.

“Recovery” (or flashing) USB connection. A USB cable must connect the



USB-mini jack on the left-rear corner of the devkit to a USB jack on the host

PC. The OS that the host PC must be running will depend on the OS being

installed on the devkit, and will be documented in the platform pack for that

particular OS.

Power. The supplied 15V power supply should be connected to the power

jack on the rear edge of the devkit main board. Depending on the setting of

the “ACOK” switch described previously, applying power to the board may

cause it to switch on automatically. Earlier Tegra devkits used a 12V power

supply with a similar connector: this 12V power supply is not compatible

with the Tegra 250 devkit and must not be used.

Additional items that should be connected to the devkit for general post-

install interaction with the devkit include

Powered USB hub. As a mobile development kit, the devkit is not designed

to provide large amounts of power to external devices. Thus, external

devices other than the most basic mice and keyboards should be connected

to a powered USB hub. This powered hub should be connected to one of

the two stacked USB jacks on the left-front edge of the devkit main board.

USB keyboard and mouse: both of these should be connected to the

powered USB hub. If required, a basic USB keyboard and mouse pair can

be connected to the two stacked USB jacks, but if possible, a powered hub

is recommended.

WiFi Antenna. The threaded end of the WiFi antenna should be firmly

screwed onto the WiFi antenna connector on the rear edge of the devkit

main board .

Some devkit operating system images may also require additional items to



be connected, including:

Expansion board. If required, the two ribbon cables connected to the small

expansion board should be connected to the matching pair of headers on

the devkit main board’s front edge. Take care to ensure that all of the pins

align.

Ethernet. An Ethernet cable can be connected to the Ethernet jack on the left

edge of the devkit main board.

External storage. Operating systems requiring large file systems may require

external storage, either a USB “thumb drive” or a USB hard drive. In either

case, these storage devices should be connected to a powered hub that is in

turn connected to the devkit main board .



CHAPTER-7INSTALLING OPERATING SYSTEM IMAGE ONTO THE

DEVELOPER KITThis chapter deals with how to place the personal computer of the host in

the recovery mode . Recovery mode host pc OSB driver is also explained here .

We will not focus on OS-specific install instructions.

Each operating system image ships in its own distribution pack, and

developers should consult the documentation for that operating system image for

details on how to install it. However, all of the OS support packs require the devkit

device to be in recovery mode as a first step. The operating system image packs

will in turn reference this documentation with regards to placing the device into

“recovery mode”. Recovery mode is a special, low-level booting mode that leaves

the device ready to receive a new operating system image over USB.

7.1 Placing the Devkit into Recovery Mode

To place the devkit into recovery mode:

Connect the 15V power supply to the devkit and to mains power.

Power on the device

If the device turns on immediately (i.e. the red and green power

LEDs near the center of the main board turn on), you may wish to

ensure that the “ACOK” switch on the front edge of the main board

is in the leftmost (BATT) position for future use.

.If the board does not spontaneously turn on, then press and hold

the power button until the power LEDs light to turn on the device.



Fig 7.1 : Powering on the device

This figure shows which button to press to turn on the power lights of the

board .

Press and hold the recovery mode button (marked “F.R.” on the main board)

along the front edge of the devkit main board

Press and hold



Fig 7.2 : pressing recovery button

This figure shows which button to press to put the board in the recoverymode .

While continuing to hold the recovery mode button with one finger, use

another finger (or another hand) to press the adjacent reset button. Hold the

reset button down for 1-2 seconds.

Fig 7.3 : Pressing reset button

This figure shows which button to press and by how much time to reset

the board .

Release the reset button while still holding the recovery button.



Fig 7.4 : Releasing reset button

This figure shows which button to release after resetting the board

.Recovery button is continued to be in the hold position .

After a further 1-2 seconds, release the recovery button



Fig 7.5 : Releasing recovery button

This figure shows which button to release after the board is in recovery

mode .

Connect a mini-USB to USB-A cable between the host PC and the mini-

USB jack on the rear-left corner of the devkit main board.

If this is the first time that the host PC has been used to flash a devkit device,

then you may be prompted to install the USB driver for the newly-found

device. This driver should have been supplied with the operating system

image, as it is dependent upon the host PC OS used to flash the device. See

the following section for a discussion of this process on Windows XP.

Once the driver is confirmed to be running, the device is in recovery mode.

Continue following the platform pack’s OS install instructions to complete

the OS installation.

7.2 Recovery Mode Host PC USB Driver

While each OS support pack may require its own host PC OS, the most

common host OS for the devkit is Windows. This section describes how to install

the recovery mode driver onto a Windows host PC. If an OS support pack requires

a different host PC OS (such as Linux), that pack’s documentation will describe

how to install the recovery mode driver.

The documentation for the support pack will indicate the location of

the PC recovery mode driver to be used.

In the case of an OS that is flashed using Windows as the host PC OS (e.g.

Windows CE 6.0), the method is to install the driver using the “install from a

specific location” option in the “New Device Wizard” dialog box. This dialog box

will pop up automatically (if required) when the devkit is connected to the host PC

while the devkit is in recovery mode. Note that the driver can take a long time to



install (in some cases, as long as 5 minutes). During the install process, you may

see the following dialog box (under XP):

Fig 7.6 : Window logo testing promptThis figure shows the windows logo testing prompt which appears during

the recover process .

Click “Continue Anyway” to install the driver. If the host PC OS being

used to flash the device is Windows, then to verify that the devkit is connected to

the host PC, open the Device Manager via:

Start Menu : Control Panel : System : Hardware : Device Manager

Verify that you see a device called

Nvidia USB Boot-recovery driver for Mobile devices"

under the heading

Device Manager -> Universal Serial Bus Controllers

in the device manager as follows:



Fig 7.7 : Device manager

This figure shows the device manager of the host pc . It is opened to

confirm the nvidia usb boot-recovery driver for mobile devices .

If you don't see this device, disconnect the devkit from the host PC, place

it into recovery mode again, and restart this procedure from the beginning, as the

lack of an active device in the panel indicates that the connection has not been

made or that the device was not actually in recovery mode. Do not continue with

the following steps until the NVIDIA device appears in the device list. Check the

NVIDIA Tegra developers’ website for troubleshooting tips .



CHAPTER -8

USING THE BOOTED DEVELOPER KITThis chapter deals with how to develop the nvidia tegra 250 developer kit

os using the already configured host personal computer .

Once you have installed a host OS onto your devkit, the platform support

pack’s documentation will describe how you can develop for that devkit OS using

the already-configured host PC. The platform support pack documentation for

your selected OS image should also include useful information on developing for

that Tegra platform. Consult it for additional details on the development process.

In addition to the platform support packs, other optional packs are

available to assist in development for the devkit, depending on OS:

• A Windows XP/Vista/7 OpenKODE and OpenGL ES2.0 emulation wrapper,

which allows cross-platform application development. Code written to

compile and run on this PC-based, HW accelerated emulation “wrapper” can

also be compiled and run on the devkit using the aforementioned Windows

CE 6.0 devkit platform pack.

• A cross-platform application-level samples SDK including documentation,

support libraries and demos as source code, shader code, and art assets.

These libraries and demos can compile for the devkit under most Tegra

operating systems, including Windows CE 6.0, Linux and for the Windows

desktop PC ES2 emulator as well, and show how the Tegra’s multimedia

capabilities can be unlocked via the Khronos media APIs



CHAPTER -9

CONCLUSIONThis chapter deals with the conclusions which arrived till now. The nvidia

tegra 250 developers kit provides almost all necessary hardwares required to install

that particular operating system onto the personal computer of the host and the

proper booting of that operating system onto it .The items which are not provided

in the developer kit is to be managed by the developer himself .He had to take

decision which display he is going to use before starting the installation process . It

is very easy and takes very less time to install the operating system onto the

developers kit .All the steps required to be done are well documented in the nvidia

tegra website .

It is the host personal computer operating system which determines which

operating system are allowed to be installed onto it . Before installing any

operating system on the developers kit , it should must be kept in the recovery

mode . Meanwhile if there is any mistake in choosing the correct operating system

, another operating system can be installed onto it but all the things are to be

redone by the developer .Windows and linux on the host personal computer

support windows and linux on the devkit respectively ,but if mac is going to be

installed onto the developer kit , host pc can have any one of the two either

windows or linux .



REFERENCES[1] Kit. Raúl Porcel , “NVIDIA Tegra 250 Developer Kit Hardware Introduction

and setup” , Version 100113.01, NVIDIA Corporation , 2009-10-09.

[2] Eric Proof , “ IQ24_Intelligence ” ,volume 7 ,Glenn ImObersteg ,2009-11-03 .

[3] P. G. Wodehouse , “Nvidia Tegra Multi-processor Architecture” ,volume 1,

White paper ,2010-01-08 .

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