Programming the V80 FPGA

Download the bitstream for your FPGA

The bitstream is available on the Github Release page alongside the Vollo SDK. For example to download the bitstream for the AMD v80 board with the c6b32 configuration of Vollo:

curl -LO https://github.com/MyrtleSoftware/vollo-sdk/releases/download/v24.0.0/vollo-amd-v80-c6b32-24.0.tar.gz
mkdir -p $VOLLO_SDK/bitstream
tar -xzf vollo-amd-v80-c6b32-24.0.tar.gz -C $VOLLO_SDK/bitstream

Programming the FPGA over PCIe

If your FPGA is already programmed with the Vollo accelerator then you can update the bitstream over PCIe. You can check if the device is programmed with the Myrtle.ai Vollo bitstream by running:

$ lspci -d 1ed9:
01:00.0 Processing accelerators: Myrtle.ai Device 100a
01:00.1 Processing accelerators: Myrtle.ai Device 000a

If the device has not been programmed with the vollo bitstream then you will need to program the board over JTAG. See Programming the FPGA via JTAG below.

Programming over PCIe is the preferred method of programming the board as it is faster than programming over JTAG, and does not require a USB programming cable or for Vivado to be installed.

  1. Build and insert the ami driver.

    cd ami_kernel_driver
make
sudo insmod ami.ko

    There may be compilation issues with your version of Linux. This has been checked with Rocky Linux 8.10. If there is an issue with your system, please contact us.

  2. Once the kernel driver is loaded you can program the flash with vollo-tool (which uses ami_tool). If you only have one board, device_index is 0.

    sudo $VOLLO_SDK/bin/vollo-tool fpga-config overwrite-partition ${device_index:?} $VOLLO_SDK/bitstream/vollo-amd-v80-c6b32.pdi USER_IMAGE

    There will be a progress bar and it should take around 5 minutes to program the flash. You will need to power cycle the host for the new bitstream to be loaded.

    Sometimes a V80 host machine will hang on boot. You may need to force another power cycle of the host to bring it back. Occasionally a power cycle isn't enough and you may need to turn the power off for several minutes before turning it back on.

  3. If successful the device should now enumerate as a Myrtle.ai Vollo device:

    $ lspci -d 1ed9:
01:00.0 Processing accelerators: Myrtle.ai Device 100a
01:00.1 Processing accelerators: Myrtle.ai Device 000a

Programming the FPGA via JTAG

Programming a V80 board over JTAG is only needed if the board does not enumerate correctly. Programming over PCIe is preferred. If the board does not enumerate or there is some other issue with PCIe programming then JTAG programming is the only option.

This requires a USB cable to be connected to the accelerator card and Vivado to be installed on the system so that the device can be programmed over JTAG.

  1. Download and install Vivado Lab Edition:

    • Navigate to the Vivado Design Tools download page.

    • Under "Vivado Lab Solutions" find "Vivado 2024.2: Lab Edition - Linux (TAR/GZIP - 1.99 GB)" (later versions may be available).

    • Download the file and extract it to a directory of your choice. You will need an AMD account to download the file. You can create an account for free.

    • Pick a location to install Vivado_Lab, e.g. /opt/Xilinx, a user directory like ~/Xilinx is also fine:

      VIVADO_DIR=~/Xilinx
mkdir -p $VIVADO_DIR

    • Extract the tarball:

      tar xf Vivado_Lab_Lin_2024.2_1113_1001.tar
cd Vivado_Lab_Lin_2024.2_1113_1001/

    • Run the installer:

      ./xsetup --agree 3rdPartyEULA,XilinxEULA --batch Install --edition "Vivado Lab Edition (Standalone)" --location $VIVADO_DIR

    • Check that installation was successful:

      $ $VIVADO_DIR/Vivado_Lab/2024.2/bin/vivado_lab -version
Vivado Lab Edition v2024.2 (64-bit)
SW Build 5239620 on Fri Nov 08 16:21:51 MST 2024
Tool Version Limit: 2024.11
Copyright 1986-2022 Xilinx, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Copyright 2022-2024 Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

  2. Run the program_v80_fpt.tcl script to program the V80 board:

    sudo $VIVADO_DIR/Vivado_Lab/2024.2/bin/vivado_lab -mode batch -source ./flash_vollo-amd-v80-c6b32.tcl

    This prints out a lot of lines while programming and takes about 10 minutes.

    If you get an error like this:

    ERROR: [Labtoolstcl 44-469] There is no current hw_target.

    Make sure that you ran vivado_lab with sudo and that the USB cable is plugged in.

    After programming you must power cycle the host for the new bitstream to be loaded.

    Sometimes a V80 host machine will hang on boot. You may need to force another power cycle of the host to bring it back. Occasionally a power cycle isn't enough and you may need to turn the power off for several minutes before turning it back on.

  3. If successful the device should now enumerate as a Myrtle.ai Vollo device:

    $ lspci -d 1ed9:
01:00.0 Processing accelerators: Myrtle.ai Device 100a
01:00.1 Processing accelerators: Myrtle.ai Device 000a