Monday, January 20, 2020

Xilinx FTDI License

Xilinx tools can work with FTDI (FT2232/FT232/FT4232) based USB chips as JTAG adapter if they are programmed with "Digilent License" - this license includes special FTDI EEPROM configuration and also special data in the "user EEPROM" area that is not visible with regular FTDI tools.

NOTE: any EEPROM writing with FTDI provided tools will automatically erase user EEPROM with no confirmation asked, if this happens then the adapter will no longer be recognized by Xilinx tools.

Recovery: Digilent has/had a recovery tool available to recover the EEPROM in case it was accidentally over-written.

Digilent has licensed manufacturing rights for FTDI JTAG solutions to a small number of companies. As of today now no new licenses are issued by Digilent. If on-board solution is required then the options are:

https://shop.trenz-electronic.de/de/TE0790-03-XMOD-FTDI-JTAG-Adapter-Xilinx-kompatibel
https://shop.trenz-electronic.de/en/24625-JTAG-SMT2-Surface-Mount-Programming-Module

There is an legal option to provide Xilinx tools compatibility without using Digilent License, this can be done using custom XVC server that talks Xilinx XVC protocol and forwards the JTAG commands to FTDI device with empty user EEPROM. There are some commercial products using this method.

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