no free buffers for rx

A Quick Update: what is different between ncpballoc and ncpalloc, as ALTERA_PKT_MEM required ncpballoc, so each time i add these changes in ipport.h it generate the attached error's

1. it says undeclared TRUE and FALSE then take out the TRUE and FALSE statement outside the loop, this error disappear (attached print-screen: error.jpg)

2. it says ncpballoc undefined refrence then i defined this in ipport.h just below

# define ALTERA_TRIPLE_SPEED_MAC,

char *ncpballoc(unsigned size);

void ncpbfree(* ptr);

attached print-screen error3.jpg and ncpballoc_error.jpg

regards

kaushal

--- Quote Start ---

#define ALTERA_PKT_MEM 1

# define ALTERA_PKT_MEM PACKET_MEM_BASE

# define ALTERA_PKT_MEM PACKET_MEM_SPAN

--- Quote End ---

Those should be 3 different defines, the word document shows:

--- Quote Start ---

#define ALTERA_MRAM_FOR_PACKETS 1

# define ALTERA_MRAM_ALLOC_BASE PACKET_MEM_BASE

# define ALTERA_MRAM_ALLOC_SPAN PACKET_MEM_SPAN

--- Quote End ---

In your code you are redefining 3 times the same symbol.

You also have to add the optimizations.c file from the Ethernet Accel Design example to your own project, so that it can find references to the ncpballoc functions.

I don't see any connection to the descriptors memory on your SOPC screenshot.

hello

Daixiwen please see the attached print screen for descriptor memory decriptor_mem.jpg.

i have correct the ipport.h and add the optimization.c file to my project and compile the project in Nios II-Eclips initially my configuration is:

packet memory size is 65536 (packet_mem_High.jpeg) and Tse mac fifo depths 2048x32 (packet_mem_High.jpeg & Project_Info.jpeg)

i have got the error saying :: panic: out of mem

then i reduce the TSE_MAC FIFO Depth (2048x32 to 512x32) and keeping Packet memory size fix (65536) (plz see tse_512x32_on_chip_32768.jpeg)

again i got the same error "panic: out of mem", then reduce the Packet memory from 65536 to 32768 (plz see attached on_chip_mem_32768.jpeg) and again i got the same error "panic: out of mem".

shouild i further reduce the packet memory size,

i have Altera Embedded Development Board having Cyclone-III Device.

earlier when i do not using packet memory, i put TSE_MAC FIFO Depth to its maximum level (There is slider button on tse_mac) at that time i am not facing any such errors. and able to receive 450 UDP packet of Size 512.

Regards

kaushal

You can leave the fifo length to its maximum value, this memory is made with the FPGA's M9X blocks and isn't seen by the software.

The cause of this panic is that the TCP/IP stack doesn't have enough space in your packet memory to allocate all its buffers. Reducing the packet memory size actually made things worse.

You should put back the packet memory to 64k in SOPC builder and modify ipport.h to ask the stack to allocate less buffers, so that it sticks in your packet memory. If you have a look at your word document, it is described in step 3. The total number of bytes allocated by the stack is NUMBIGBUFS*BIGBUFSIZE+LILBUFSIZE*NUMLILBUFS, and this number must be less than the size of your packet memory. As you can't reduce BIGBUFSIZE the best option is to reduce the number of buffers, NUMBIGBUFS and NUMLILBUFS.

Hello there,

I have make FIFO to its maximum value and that is 65536 x 32 Bits (Attached Print screen of TSE FIFO). And On chip memory is 65535 x 32. I don’t have any idea what become the descriptor memory size?

i have made following changes in ipport.h

#define NUMBIGBUFS 512

#define NUMLILBUFS 1

/* some maximum packet buffer numbers */

#define MAXBIGPKTS 512

#define MAXLILPKTS 1

#define MAXPACKETS (MAXLILPKTS+MAXBIGPKTS)

#define BIGBUFSIZE 512*200

#define LILBUFSIZE 1//128

Which satisified the equation

NUMBIGBUFS*BIGBUFSIZE+LILBUFSIZE*NUMLILBUFS = Size is equal oa less then packet memory that mean

That is

512*512*200+1*1 = 52,428,800

Or 52,428,800/1024 = 51,200 <65535 (packet mmory)

and still i got the same error saying "panic: out of mem"

regards

kaushal

I don't understand your calculation. The total calculated sive is 52MBytes, which is too much by far... why do you divide by 1024?

The idea behind those buffers is to being able to store as many packets as possible in memory and waste as little as possible. The main idea is that there are usually two cases: small packets (such as DHCP request/answers, ICMP, TCP connection requests or acknowledges) and big packets that contain data. Big packets are limited to the maximum you can send through Ethernet, which is 1536 bytes. For the small packets 128 is a good limit. You shouldn't change those two values, except if you have a good reason to think it will optimize memory usage in your specific application. You should rather change the number of packet buffers to fill the packet memory.

Using NUMBIGBUFS and NUMLILBUF at 30 with BIGBUFSIZE at 1536 and LILBUFSIZE at 128 should fit in a 65536 bytes packet memory.

As for the descriptors I don't remember how the driver uses them. 1k is more than enough, but you need to check in the driver code how it allocates the descriptors and see if you need to change anything to use your dedicated memories. It may be easier to forget about descriptor memory for now, connect the dma descriptor masters to the main memory and let the driver as it is.

Hello There,

You are right, I though these values is in bits’ but these values is in bytes. Anyway as you suggest, i have given NUMBIGBUFS = 30, MAXBIGPKT = 30 and BIGBUFSIZE = 1536, though there is no error (like in previous case: "panic: out of mem"), but during receiving (run time) the packet it again says

[tse_sgdma_read_init] fatal error: no free buffer for RX

Init error -21 on net[0] (Please see the print-screen forthis error).

This BIGBUFSIZE which we are making 1536 is the place where all the receive packet stays or this is the maximum size of packet received FROM REMOTE MACHINE? In my specific application i have maximum UDP packet size is 512 bytes, so shouild i make this BIGBUFSIZE is 512? And as i am aspecting 512 (in number) UDP packets from remote machine so could i make my MAXBIGPKTS = 512. But if i do so, it not satisfied the condation

numbigbufs*bigbufsize+lilbufsize*numlilbufs <=packet memory size (which is 65536 or 64kb)

And again says "panic: out of mem"

*what is the maximum value that i can assign to on-chip-memory (packet memory), is it 64k or 512k or something else?

Please comment on this

Regards

Kaushal

What you could do is indeed to increase NUMBIGBUFS to 512, and re-use the main memory instead of the on-chip RAM. It will be slower but it might be able to store all your UDP packets.

The maximum size of the on-chip memory depends on the FPGA that you have. An EP3C120 has about 300kbytes on integrated RAM, but some of it is also used by the CPU's caches, and the TSE FIFOs.