rwheadon

Hi @hardlyhacker, just an update - the ethernetlite IP can be used without payment (only limit is 100Mbps maximum rate). I stumbled on this project for the Arty which works as advertised and shouldn't be too difficult to implement on the Nexys Video: https://www.avnet.com/opasdata/d120001/medias/docus/178/UG-AES-A7MB-7A35T-G-Arty_lwIP_EthernetLite_VIV2015_v1.pdf The project file was difficult to find but I finally found it here: https://products.avnet.com/opasdata/d120001/medias/common/10/7A35T_Arty_Ethernetlite_LwIP_VIV2015_2.zip Regards, Richard

Hi @Sergiu, I consider the DHCP a non-issue. With the demo code loaded at start-up from flash there is no DHCP timeout. However the demo code project on the Digilent web site and the project that @jpeyron built for me the code includes the board reverting to 192.168.1.100 if the DHCP request times out. In any case I also set the SDK to not use DHCP so that the echo application generated uses a fixed 192.168.1.10 IP address with identical (non) results. Independent code (https://github.com/alexforencich/verilog-ethernet) which does not use DHCP works for another evaluation board but not for this one.This specific board has never shown any sign of being able to correctly receive an Ethernet packet after a week of trying (and I am not new to using Ethernet with FPGA's, both with and without Microblaze) and it is going back. Thanks anyway, Richard

Hi @jpeyron without the ARP response there can be no connection so no, the echo server has never worked in any of the many attempts that I have made with the various projects. I firmly believe that this is a defective board and will take the fact that the echo server has absolutely no problems with your board and that you have seen the ethernet peripheral test pass at least once whereas I have now repeated this test more than twenty times counting only for the project that you provided me with zero success as sufficient evidence for returning it. Really grateful for your help, Richard PS a couple of notes: 1. It seems that the peripheral test with this project (in my case with the Ethernet test call disabled) can only be reliably run once after programming the FPGA 2. the UDP checksum error you see in my Wireshark captures is due to the Ethernet interface on my PC handling it at a lower level than Wireshark can reach, it is not a real error

Hi @hardlyhacker, if you got an echo at 1Gbps you're fine hardware-wise. Regarding the licencing, my evaluation licence expired and I cannot generate a bitfile so I assume that if I needed to use Ethernet with an embedded system that I would have to pay for it - and I'm guessing Digilent aren't too happy about that because this was and continues not to be the case for Series 6 and earlier models. When I started working with FPGA's the embedded solution was a relatively pain-free way to have reliable Ethernet communication, however I reached the point where I needed as much bandwidth as I could get so I developed my own UDP-based Ethernet implementation which, at least for now, I cannot share because it is technically my employer's property. If you don't need the rest of the embedded architecture functionality then this looks pretty interesting: https://github.com/alexforencich/verilog-ethernet Be warned, using UDP you WILL have to deal with occasional lost packets on a normal operating system.

Hi @jpeyron Sorry, I wasn't clear enough. Without an ARP reply from the board no connection can be established. This is what to expect for the echo server application project when opening the TCP connection for the first time after running the program on the FPGA (in this case I am using an SP605 microblaze project): It is the ARP response (packet 72) from the FPGA which is missing from all my attempts to communicate with the Nexys Video. This is the console output for the standard peripheral test application project generated in Vivado 2015.4 SDK for the project you created for me: It hangs on the Ethernet test, just as with the Nexys Video User Demo project and the Vivado 2016.4 Microblaze Server project. With Xilinx hardware I have never seen this happen (and I am talking about something like forty evaluation boards over the years). Can you please check to see if your board passes this test? Thanks again, Richard PS sorry @hardlyhacker for hijacking your thread

Hi Jon, really appreciate the response. I didn't try the Hamsterworks code because it is transmission only and the Wireshark info for the demo project shows the correct transmission of DHCP requests. I did however try the much more complete example available here: https://github.com/alexforencich/verilog-ethernet with no luck (and I verified that the ML605 evaluation board example works as advertised). Anyway, I downloaded your project and the results are the same at 100Mbps: Confirmed also with my project 2016.4 at 100Mbps with fixed address and DHCP disabled. Case closed? Thanks again, Richard

Follow-up with BIST and Echo server console output for the Microblaze Server example using Vivado 2016.4: (no fail, just hangs) (the link is actually 1Gbps / Full duplex) No ARP response:

Hello, I also have just received a Nexys Video which is not responding to ARP requests.This is Wireshark when TCP communication is attempted: You can also see here that the board transmits successfully a DHCP request but no replies can be seen. My evaluation licence for the Ethernet IP has expired so I cannot use the Microblaze Server example (I'm waiting for a colleague's help with this) but I found the Nexys Video Demo page which includes a fully-compiled project and which should also act as an echo server. The software version appears to be more recent than that of the board itself because if the DHCP request times out it defaults to 192.168.1.100 instead of remaining stuck at 0.0.0.0. Using this project in Vivado 2015.4 I exported the bitfile and configuration to the SDK and compiled the standard peripheral test application which fails at the first Ethernet test and then hangs indefinitely on the second: I have worked with many Xilinx evaluation boards and have never seen this happen so at this point I am thinking that the board is defective. I will find a way to get the Microblaze Server example running with Vivado 2016.4 before I give up but since this is not a Xilinx board I would really appreciate any pointers in case I am missing something. Thanks, Richard