Using Sivers mmWave equipment on COSMOS SandBox1

Description

A pair of Sivers EVK06002s, evaluation kits for Sivers IMA TRX BF/01, are deployed on COSMOS SandBox1. TRX BF/01 is a 16+16 IEEE802.11ad Beamforming Transceiver with a complete Radio front-end with 57-66 GHz mmWave frequency range. This tutorial demonstrates how to transmit and receive a signal in the 60GHz mmWave spectrum using these Sivers front-ends.

Current mmWave setup in COSMOS SB1 looks as shown in the figure below.

In the benchtop 60GHz setup of SandBox1, either USRP X310 or RFSoC ZCU111 can be used for baseband processing. RF Switch boxes as shown in the figure are used to select between X310 and RFSoC. RF switch commands are explained at wiki:/Resources/Services/RFSwitch. To select X310s as baseband processing units, all the switches in the RF switch boxes are configured to port 1.

This experiment uses the Xilinx ZynqMP Ultrascale+ RFSoC ZCU111 board for the baseband processing. Sivers control software on srv3, srv4 talk to the mmWave front-ends over USB links. Host GNURadio applications on srv3, srv4, send/receive data samples to/from the RFSoC over 1G Ethernet link.

Prerequisites

In order to access the test bed, create a reservation and have it approved by the reservation service. Access to the resources is granted after the reservation is confirmed. Please follow the process shown on the COSMOS getting started page to get started.

Resources required

2 servers srv3-lg1, srv4-lg1, 2 USRP X310s rfdev3-1, rfdev3-2 and both the Sivers platforms rfdev3-5, rfdev3-6 on COSMOS SB1.

Tutorial Setup

Follow the steps below to gain access to the sandbox 1 console and set up nodes with appropriate images.

1. If you don't have one already, sign up for a ​COSMOS account
2. Create a resource reservation on sandbox 1
3. Login into sandbox 1 console (console.sb1.cosmos-lab.org) with two SSH sessions.
4. Make sure all the nodes and devices of this reservation are turned off:

   omf tell -a offh -t system:topo:allres
   

5. The image rfsoc_sivers_sb1_cosmos.ndz is [baseline_uhd.ndz] with Sivers control software and the Xilinx XSCT software installed Load sivers_sb1_cosmos.ndz on srv3,srv4.

   omf load -i rfsoc_sivers_sb1_cosmos.ndz -t srv3-lg1,srv4-lg1
   

6. Turn all the required resources on and check the status

   omf tell -a on -t srv3-lg1,srv4-lg1,rfdev3-3,rfdev3-4,rfdev3-5,rfdev3-6
   

7. Check that the nodes are turned on

   omf stat -t system:topo:allres
   

8. ssh to the nodes, use option -Y for using GUI.

Experiment Execution

Prepare RFSoC boards

We need to download the FPGA firmware, the linux image and the rootfs over the JTAG. We use the Xilinx XSCT tool to do that. Note that this process will take around 5-10'.

• Configure the FPGA firmware of the rfdev3-3 from the srv3-lg1 as follows:

  root@srv3-lg1:~# cd rfsoc/firmware/sb1_rfdev3_3/
  root@srv3-lg1:~/rfsoc/firmware/sb1_rfdev3_3# xsct download_firmware.tcl
  

• Configure the FPGA firmware of the rfdev3-4 from the srv4-lg1 as follows:

  root@srv4-lg1:~# cd rfsoc/firmware/sb1_rfdev3_4/
  root@srv4-lg1:~/rfsoc/firmware/sb1_rfdev3_4# xsct download_firmware.tcl
  

• You can connect to FPGA over a serial monitor as follows:

  root@srv3-lg1:~# minicom -D /dev/ttyUSB5
  root@srv4-lg1:~# minicom -D /dev/ttyUSB1
  

Prepare Sivers 60GHz front-ends

• To demonstrate the experiment here, we use Sivers front-end SN0240 as transmitter and SN0243 as receiver

SN0240 as transmitter	SN0243 as receiver
root@srv4-lg1:~/ederenv# ./start_mb1.sh --gui SN0240	root@srv3-lg1:~/ederenv# ./start_mb1.sh --gui SN0243
Click "Enable Tx" and "LO leakage Cal"	Click "Enable Rx"

• Make sure the RF switch boxes are configured to use X310s (all switches set to port 2)

  root@console:~# curl am1.cosmos-lab.org:5054/rf_switch/status?name=rfsw1.sb1.cosmos-lab.org,rfsw2.sb1.cosmos-lab.org
  
  <response status="OK">
    <rf_switch name="rfsw1.sb1.cosmos-lab.org" num_of_switches="4">
      <switch number="1" port="2"/>
      <switch number="2" port="2"/>
      <switch number="3" port="2"/>
      <switch number="4" port="2"/>
    </rf_switch>
    <rf_switch name="rfsw2.sb1.cosmos-lab.org" num_of_switches="4">
      <switch number="1" port="2"/>
      <switch number="2" port="2"/>
      <switch number="3" port="2"/>
      <switch number="4" port="2"/>
    </rf_switch>
  </response>
  

• If some or all the ports are set to "1", set them to port "2"

  curl "am1.cosmos-lab.org:5054/rf_switch/set?name=rfsw1.sb1.cosmos-lab.org,rfsw2.sb1.cosmos-lab.org&switch=1,2,3,4&port=2"
  

Execution

Run the experiment

• Start transmit application on the TX node(srv4-lg1). Run the tx_waveforms python script in the examples folder:

  root@srv3-lg1:~/rfsoc/examples# ./tx_waveforms
  

• Start transmit application on the RX node(srv3-lg1). Run the rx_waveforms python script in the examples folder:

  root@srv3-lg1:~/rfsoc/examples# ./tx_waveforms
  

Tx Waveform	Rx Waveform