Author: System on Chips

ARM Cortex-M0 Bootloader to Application Jump Mechanics The process of transitioning from a bootloader to an application on an ARM Cortex-M0 processor, such as the XMC1302, involves several critical steps that must be meticulously handled to ensure a smooth and reliable jump. The Cortex-M0, being a Thumb-only processor, executes instructions in Thumb mode, which inherently…

ARM Cortex-A Hypervisor Timer Interrupt Configuration and Debugging When working with ARM Cortex-A processors in a hypervisor environment, configuring and debugging timer interrupts can be a complex task, especially when dealing with Exception Levels (ELs) and the Generic Interrupt Controller (GIC). The issue at hand involves a hypervisor running in EL2 (AArch64) attempting to use…

EL2 Memory Corruption During Secure to Non-Secure Memory Access The core issue revolves around memory corruption observed when attempting to read a memory block at address 0x80280000 from Exception Level 2 (EL2) after the memory was initially configured and loaded by a bootloader running at Exception Level 3 (EL3). The memory corruption manifests as random…

Cortex-M7 Speculative Instruction Fetch from Uninitialized Memory The Cortex-M7 processor, known for its high performance and advanced features, can exhibit unexpected behavior when it performs speculative instruction fetches from uninitialized or reserved memory regions. This issue arises when the processor attempts to fetch instructions from addresses that are not explicitly defined or initialized in the…

GIC Interrupt Configuration Mismatch Between IP and GIC Registers The core issue revolves around the configuration of the ARM Generic Interrupt Controller (GIC) to handle interrupts generated by an Intellectual Property (IP) block. Specifically, the IP generates edge-triggered interrupts, but there is a question of whether the GIC can be programmed to handle these interrupts…

ARM Helium (CM85) Transpose Intrinsic Absence Compared to Neon The ARM Cortex-M85 processor, equipped with the Helium (M-Profile Vector Extension, MVE) instruction set, introduces significant enhancements for vector processing compared to its predecessors. However, developers transitioning from Neon-based architectures (e.g., Cortex-A series) to Helium may encounter challenges due to differences in intrinsic support. One such…

GICv3 Interrupt Initialization Challenges in U-Boot at EL2 The ARM Generic Interrupt Controller version 3 (GICv3) is a critical component in ARM-based systems, responsible for managing interrupts across multiple cores and exception levels. When working with U-Boot, a popular bootloader for embedded systems, initializing and handling interrupts using GICv3 can be particularly challenging, especially when…

ARM BP210 Bus Matrix Address Overlap Errors During Master-Slave Configuration When configuring the ARM BP210 bus matrix using ARM Socrates, a common issue arises when attempting to define shared address mappings for multiple masters accessing the same slave. Specifically, the error message "Interface SI1 address region ‘MI3: A0000000-AFFFFFFF’ overlaps with another address region ‘MI0: A0000000-AFFFFFFF’"…

Debug Logs Not Displaying in Serial Viewer During Debug Mode When working with a Cortex-M0 microcontroller in KEIL uVision 5, one of the most common issues developers face is the inability to view debug logs transmitted via UART1 in a serial viewer while in debug mode. This issue can stem from a variety of factors,…

ARM Cortex-R52 PMHF Calculation and Unit Clarification The Probabilistic Metric for Hardware Failure (PMHF) is a critical metric in Functional Safety analysis, particularly when evaluating the reliability of systems designed to meet ISO 26262 or similar safety standards. In the context of the ARM Cortex-R52 processor, PMHF is used to quantify the likelihood of random…