Updating the FPGA of the DT7816

Occasionally, Data Translation may have updates to the FPGA EEPROM that is on the DT7816 module.

To update the FPGA of your DT7816, you will need the following:

• A micro SD card capable of storing a minimum of 1 GB of data. If your host computer does not have a built-in SD card reader, you will need a USB SD card reader.

• A Linux host computer, or a Windows host computer running a program such as Win 32 Disk Imager.

Note that this procedure will not affect any user applications or calibration settings on the module.

Perform the following steps to update the FGPA of the DT7816 module:

1. From the Software Download tab of the DT7816 page on our website, download the latest FPGA/NAND image file (dt7816_x.x_sdcard.img, where x.x represents the version of the file) to a local directory on your host computer.
   This file is currently 300 MB in size.

2. Insert the micro SD card into the card reader, and plug the card reader into the host computer.

3. If you are using a Windows host computer, run the Win32 Disk Imager program, select the file that you downloaded in step 1 as the image file, select the SD card as the device, and click Write to copy the file to the SD card. Then, proceed to step 6.

4. If you are using a Linux host computer, list the block devices using one of the following commands to see where the SD card is located:

# lsblk

or

# sudo fdisk - l

5. Assuming that the SD card is found in the directory /dev/sdb, copy the downloaded image to the SD card using the following command, where x.x represents the version of the file:

# sudo dd if=dt7816_x.x_sdcard.img of=/dev/sdb bs=4M

Note that you may have to unmount the SD card before performing this step.

6. Once the file is copied (the Linux prompt is displayed), remove the SD card from the host computer and insert it into the SD card connector of the DT7816 module, shown below:
   
   

7. Power cycle (unplug/plug in the power cable) of the DT7816 module or press the reset switch on the module, shown below:
   
   

8. As the DT7816 starts to boot up, press the Enter key to abort the boot sequence.
   The U-Boot prompt is displayed.

9. At the U-Boot prompt, enter the command dt78xx_init to update the FPGA:

# dt78xx_init
 Erase and program FPGA eeprom? <Y/N>

10. At the prompt Erase and program FPGA eeprom? <Y/N>, enter Y:

 Erase and program FPGA eeprom? <Y/N>
# Y
 Erase and program NAND flash? <Y/N>

11. At the prompt Erase and program NAND flash? <Y/N>, enter N:

 Erase and program NAND flash? <Y/N>
# N

12. When the Linux command prompt reappears, remove the SD card and power cycle the DT7816 or press the reset switch on the DT7816 module to reboot the module with the updated FPGA.