ClearFog LX2162A Quick Start Guide

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Introduction

The following quick start guide provides background information about the ClearFog LX2162A products which use the LX2162A System on module.

The guide will give a technical overview about the product and by the end of it you should be able to boot an operating system and begin testing your application.

Revision and Notes

Hardware Setup

Product Specifications

Block Diagram

The following figure describes the ClearFog LX2162A Block Diagram.

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Visual features overview

Please see below the features overview of the connector side of the ClearFog LX2162A

Software Setup

Cable setup and prerequisites

Here is what you will need to power up the board:

• Linux or Windows PC

• ClearFog LX2162A

• Power adapter 5A@12V or ATX 60W+

• Mini-USB to USB for console, the ClearFog LX2162A has an onboard FTDI chip.

• IP router or IP switch

Recommended Cables

The following is a list of industry-standard cables, sorted by type, with the necessary compliance requirements that have been proven to work well with the ClearFog product family.

These examples are the cables which SolidRun uses for testing, and should provide enough information to source products from your preferred cable vendor.

• Ethernet cable: Monoprice 24AWG Cat6A 500MHz STP

• USB Cable: SuperSpeed USB 3.0 Type A Male to Female Extension Cable in Black

• SFP connector: GigaLite GE-GB-P1RT-E SFP module with Monoprice 24AWG Cat6A 500MHz STP cable

Boot Select

Before powering up the board for the first time it is recommended to select the boot media. In order to configure the boot media, please refer to the following DIP switch:

The following shows how to set the switches on the boot source selector:

Booting from an SD card

The switches on the boot source SW1 selector must be set as follows:

The following shows how to set the switches on the boot source selector:

Once you set the switches, you can apply the following for booting from an SD card.

1. Downloading the image

Download a pre-built snapshot image from SolidRun Images

Those images are organised by branch, build date and commit ID from GitHub - SolidRun/lx2160a_build  project that you can clone and build by yourself. Images filenames are generated with boot media, serdes protocol, module and board names.

For example - ls-5.15.71-2.2.0/2024-11-01_c61a32e/lx2162a_rev2_som_clearfog_2000_650_2900_18_9_0-c61a32e.img.xz generate from commit c61a32e on November 1. 2024 targets LX2162A SoM on Clearfog Board with SerDes protocols 18 and 9 (SFPs at 10/25Gbps, RJ45 at 1Gbps).

You can build your own image using the script in here – GitHub - SolidRun/lx2160a_build

1. Writing the image to the SD card

Use the following commands for writing the image to an SD card:

• For more information, please visit Flashing an SD Card .

1. SD card insertion
   Please Insert the SD card into your device.

2. Serial Connection
   Please insert the miniUSB into your device, then you can refer to Serial Connection for installing necessary serial connection software in Linux/Windows.

3. Power connection
   Connect your DC power , and then connect the adaptor to mains supply.

 Stop the u-boot count down by clicking any key –

To flash to eMMC run the following commands (it will wipe your data on the eMMC device).

Boot the machine by running ‘boot’ in u-boot.

Once you installed the necessary serial connection software and ran the above commands , you should be able to see the following:

• In order to be able to log in , please insert “root” as a username and password as follows:

1. Final stages

The following stages need to be done in order to finalize the system:

1. Run fdisk /dev/mmcblk0 if using SD, or run if using fdisk /dev/mmcblk1 eMMC.

2. Recreate the first partition by deleting it and then creating a new partition that starts at block 131072 and extends to the end of the drive (or less depending on your needs).

3. Write the new partition, when prompt about ‘Do you want to remove the signature?’ then answer with No.

4. Run resize2fs /dev/mmcblk0p1 if using SD Card, or Run resize2fs /dev/mmcblk1p1 if using eMMC.

5. In this stage the root partition should be big enough to start populating it; but first update the RTC clock.

6. Activate Network Interfaces
   The native NICs of the SoC currently are enabled automatically at boot time. Their numbering follows the numerical order of dpmac (LX2160 native NICs) starting from 0 , please find a mapping of the mac numbers to physical connectors in the picture below.
   
   

   For example the RJ45 bottom port at the end of the PCB (dpmac8) is eth11.

7. Connect the RJ45 to your network with internet access (and DHCP server); and then run dhclient .

8. Update the RTC clock by running ntpdate pool.ntp.org and then hwclock -w.

9. Run apt-update and then populate the root filesystem as you wish.

Please see below an example of resizing the filesystem :

SFP Modules

For some SFP modules that work on SolidRun networking hardware platforms, please refer to SFP Modules .

Packet Generator using DPDK

Following is an example instructions that demonstrates using the DPDK framework that is built in the lx2160a_build project under build/dpdk/ directory –

1. Make sure that the kernel is booted with the following variables in the command line –

   default_hugepagesz=1024m hugepagesz=1024m hugepages=2 isolcpus=1-15 iommu.passthrough=1

   If using the above installation of Ubuntu then the /extlinux/extlinux.conf file should look as follows (the default installation with the addition of isolcpus=1-15 iommu.passthrough=1) –

2. From build/dpdk directory under the lx2160a_build project, search for dynamic_dpl.sh and testpmd files and copy them over to the LX2160A Ubuntu root filesystem

3. After boot unbind the linux network interfaces (ethX)

4. Run the following that will generate 10Gbps traffic on dpmac.10 using only a single core. Can be used to generate traffic on dpmac.1 and other interfaces –

Notice that DPRC variable in this case holds the output of dynamic_dpl.sh

An alternative way to run testpmd in interactive mode is as follows –

Tips

1. sshd is disabled by default for root access. Edit /etc/ssh/sshd_config and set ‘PermitRootLogin yes’

2. ssh to the machine might take long time after boot. To accelerate that install ‘rng-tools’ where it’s main daemon increases the kernel’s entropy and accelerates random number key generation (which used by libssl and sshd afterwards).

Example to install Gentoo from the Ubuntu

Gentoo is a free and open-source distribution with a rolling-release model.
The bootloader and kernel provided are recent enough to install Gentoo from the eMMC Ubuntu to the NVMe or SATA device.

Build From Source

• You can build your own image using the script in here – GitHub - SolidRun/lx2160a_build

Documentation

Related Articles

• Page:

  LX2162A SOM vs LX2160A COM Differences

  • lx2160a-com

  • lx2162a-som

• Page:

  Flashing an SD Card

  • flash-sd-card

• Page:

  Serial Connection

  • serial-connection

Related pages

LX2160A COM Hardware User ManualLX2162A COM Hardware User ManualDeveloper CenterOften read together

LX2162A SoftwareLX2160A SoftwareDeveloper Center