Power XLogic has expertise on diagnostic we are offering our services to jointly develop the requirements, architecture and high-level design of Power On Self test (POST) and diagnostics for the Hardware platform in the customer’s systems. The entrance criteria to this document are the customer’s products Definition document. This document will be used as guideline for implementation and coding phase which Power XLogic is accountable. This site does not describe the detail design and implementation.
Hardware platform Power on Self Test and Diagnostics
Power on Self Test (POST) diagnostic are tests that the Hardware platform will run as part of board initialization and bring up. The POST will perform diagnostic test on hardware peripherals components on hardware platform. There will be different sets of hardware devices on each board and as a result different type of test shall be initiated on Hardware platform. If any test fails, failure code shall be sent to the Processor module LED’s indicating the failure. The failure code along with a message may also be sent to the RS-232 serial port. All references apply to both except where noted specifically for each card.
Each Hardware platform card shall have its own Power on Self test and Diagnostic functions. The Power on Self Test code shall be stored in BOOT flash and be part of the board bring up, initialization and test sequence. Power on Self test shall take place and execute before control is transferred to RTOS and operational code is started. Test results may be outputted to the serial port or board LED’s maybe lighted to indicate a test code failure.
Diagnostics test shall be performed on user demand via the board’s RS-232 interface. Both Hardware platforms shall have diagnostic test functions. Unlike the Power on Self Test, which is run automatically at boot time, the diagnostic tests are executed interactively and shall be part of the operational code. A User Interface (UI) task in operational code shall be the interface between the user and the system and shall handle such functions as invocation of different tests and decide which test to invoke, provide a menu driven I/O functions to receive user requests and output test results. Functionally, the diagnostic tests that are available to user via UI task shall be the same tests that are performed during the Power on Self Test but user shall not necessarily be allowed to run all test. That is because devices on Hardware platform are not identical. The UI task shall decide what tests the user shall be allowed to run via menu driven selection.
Power Xlogic is able to perform the following Power on Self Test and diagnostics through UI interface.
- DRAM test
- FLASH device test
- FLASH data integrity test
- RTC (Real-Time Clock) test
- Ethernet test
- RS-232 test
- I2C test
- PCI/ISA test
- CPLD test
- ASIC test
- Data path test
- I2C test
- UI/User Interface development
- Device Driver development
- Manufacturing test development
- Boot code development for any CPUs (PPC, ARM, X86, Etc.)
- Board bring up, Monitor programs
Below is the context diagram for the overall sample diagnostic functions in Hardware platform.
