new board with FT2232

[kamalesh vikramasimhan]

Hi All,

 

   We are making a new board with FT2232 on it. We want the USB JTAG functionality. 

How do we get that key for that board ? 

[JColvin]

Hi @kamalesh vikramasimhan,

I'm not certain exactly what sort of information you are looking for, but Xilinx has some material about how this might be done in their documentation here: https://docs.xilinx.com/r/en-US/ug908-vivado-programming-debugging/Programming-FTDI-Devices-for-Vivado-Hardware-Manager-Support.

Let me know if you have any questions.

Thanks,
JColvin

[Rahul Soni]

Dear JColvin,

Thank you so much for Xilinx we understood that as per the below guideline if we use Xilinx program_ftdi utility, no need to purchase any additional license from diligent 

For FTDI devices to be recognized as a USB-to-JTAG interface in AMD JTAG software tools such as XSDB or the AMD Vivado™ Hardware Manger the EEPROM on the FTDI device must be programmed. Programming the FTDI is accomplished by using the program_ftdi utility included in the Vivado install. Once programmed, the FTDI device is recognized as a valid programming cable in Vivado.

We want to double-check to avoid any confusion in the future.

The customer is making a custom board and using an FTDI chip FT2232 to program Xilinx FPGA using a USB-UART cable. 

Does the customer require any additional diligent license? 

Why I am asking because many user have asked the same question and you are helping them for license so i confuse here whether really license is required or not. 

 

[asmi]

13 hours ago, Rahul Soni said:

Does the customer require any additional diligent license? 

Not anymore.

13 hours ago, Rahul Soni said:

Why I am asking because many user have asked the same question and you are helping them for license so i confuse here whether really license is required or not. 

That's because program_ftdi was released only about a year ago, before that you had no option but to license this from Digilent.

Edited August 14, 2023 by asmi

[zygot]

Just for the curious: Here's a partial report from lsusb -v in Ubuntu 22.04 for the Nexys Video:

Bus 001 Device 011: ID 0403:6010 Future Technology Devices International, Ltd FT2232C/D/H Dual UART/FIFO IC
Device Descriptor:
  bLength                18
  bDescriptorType         1
  bcdUSB               2.00
  bDeviceClass            0
  bDeviceSubClass         0
  bDeviceProtocol         0
  bMaxPacketSize0        64
  idVendor           0x0403 Future Technology Devices International, Ltd
  idProduct          0x6010 FT2232C/D/H Dual UART/FIFO IC
  bcdDevice            7.00
  iManufacturer           1 Digilent
  iProduct                2 Digilent USB Device
  iSerial                 3 210276689477

Oddly, Digilent has it's own idVendor number, which I'm assuming costs money to acquire, but doesn't seem to use it for any of the many Digilent FPGA boards I own. I haven't checked on the ADx products. Perhaps they used it with the Digilent JTAG devices that Xilinx used to use on boards like the KC705 ( that would make sense ); I don't know.

Really, at this point the whole Digilent JTAG licensing thing is odd.

BTW, Anyone can change any of the FTDI USB bridge device EEPROM configuration bytes. Whether that constitutes an infringement is for the lawyers to decide ( and I'm not one ). What I do know is that using the FTDI idVendor and idProduct values is pretty common.

Edited August 14, 2023 by zygot

[zygot]

More trivia...

Before using FTDI bridge devices Digilent sold it own Digilent JTAG device. Xilinx used to put these on its own FPGA boards. I have KC705 and ZC702 boards that used them for configuration and ISE ChipScope. Digilents' first FPGA boards used the Cypress USB UART bridge device on its own boards like the ATLAS and Genesys. I suppose that using their own JTAG device was too expensive. The Cypress CY6813A had an onboard ARM so that functionality was programmable. I suppose that even this might constitute IP that could be licensed. For unknown reasons the CY6813A was abandoned in favor of the FTDI UART bridge devices. All of the Series7 boards that Digilent sells can really be programmed and connect to the Vivado Hardware Manager using the FTDI driver API.

Edited August 14, 2023 by zygot

[zygot]

3 hours ago, asmi said:

That's because ftdi_prog was released only about a year ago

Not sure what you are referring to but the FTDI utility of the same name has been around for ages.. ever since the FT245 came out, possibly before that.

[asmi]

2 hours ago, zygot said:

Not sure what you are referring to but the FTDI utility of the same name has been around for ages.. ever since the FT245 came out, possibly before that.

I meant program_ftdi.