Arm Cortex-A9 Processor Boot Code - 2021.1 English

Xilinx Standalone Library Documentation OS and Libraries Document Collection (UG643)

Document ID
UG643
Release Date
2021-06-16
Version
2021.1 English

The boot code performs minimum configuration which is required for an application to run starting from processor reset state of the processor. Below is a sequence illustrating what all configuration is performed before control reaches to main function.

  1. Program vector table base for exception handling
  2. Invalidate instruction cache, data cache and TLBs
  3. Program stack pointer for various modes (IRQ, FIQ, supervisor, undefine, abort, system)
  4. Configure MMU with short descriptor translation table format and program base address of translation table
  5. Enable data cache, instruction cache and MMU
  6. Enable Floating point unit
  7. Transfer control to _start which clears BSS sections, initializes global timer and runs global constructor before jumping to main application

The translation_table.S contains a static page table required by MMU for cortex-A9. This translation table is flat mapped (input address = output address) with default memory attributes defined for Zynq-7000 architecture. It utilizes short descriptor translation table format with each section defining 1 MB of memory.

The overview of translation table memory attributes is described below.

Memory Range Definition in Translation Table
DDR 0x00000000 - 0x3FFFFFFF Normal write-back Cacheable
PL 0x40000000 - 0xBFFFFFFF Strongly Ordered
Reserved 0xC0000000 - 0xDFFFFFFF Unassigned
Memory mapped devices 0xE0000000 - 0xE02FFFFF Device Memory
Reserved 0xE0300000 - 0xE0FFFFFF Unassigned
NAND, NOR 0xE1000000 - 0xE3FFFFFF Device memory
SRAM 0xE4000000 - 0xE5FFFFFF Normal write-back Cacheable
Reserved 0xE6000000 - 0xF7FFFFFF Unassigned
AMBA APB Peripherals 0xF8000000 - 0xF8FFFFFF Device Memory
Reserved 0xF9000000 - 0xFBFFFFFF Unassigned
Linear QSPI - XIP 0xFC000000 - 0xFDFFFFFF Normal write-through cacheable
Reserved 0xFE000000 - 0xFFEFFFFF Unassigned
OCM 0xFFF00000 - 0xFFFFFFFF Normal inner write-back cacheable
Note: For region 0x00000000 - 0x3FFFFFFF, a system where DDR is less than 1 GB, region after DDR and before PL is marked as undefined/reserved in translation table. In 0xF8000000 - 0xF8FFFFFF, 0xF8000C00 - 0xF8000FFF, 0xF8010000 - 0xF88FFFFF and 0xF8F03000 to 0xF8FFFFFF are reserved but due to granual size of 1 MB, it is not possible to define separate regions for them. For region 0xFFF00000 - 0xFFFFFFFF, 0xFFF00000 to 0xFFFB0000 is reserved but due to 1MB granual size, it is not possible to define separate region for it.