IPRO7AI Reef EVK V4.0¶

V4.0

The IPRO7AI Reef EVK is built around an IPRO7AI (QFN56) with its flash and PSRAM inside the chip package. The board carries an OV5640 camera connector, a PDM digital microphone, a headset jack and a speaker amplifier, a microSD socket, an RGB LED, keys, and a 40-pin expansion header in the same position and pin order as on a Raspberry Pi. It is powered from USB-C only and has no LCD and no battery. This page covers the V4.0 board (silkscreen "IPRO7AI REEF EVK V4.0"); every step on this site is written for it.

On-board features¶

Specifications follow the V4.0 design files (schematic and bill of materials).

Switches and jumpers¶

To measure the IPRO7AI's current, unplug USB-C, connect an ammeter between JP2 pins 1 and 2 (or an external 3.3 V supply across pins 2 and 3), slide SW8 to MEAS, then plug USB-C back in. When you are done, unplug USB-C, slide SW8 back to PWR and only then remove the ammeter. The reading covers the IPRO7AI's 3.3 V pins with their decoupling capacitors and the boot-strap pull-ups, not the peripherals.

Quick start¶

At the end the board runs the out-of-box firmware ipro7ai_reef_demo and answers reef selftest on its console. The host needs the RISC-V toolchain (from INTELPRO), IntelProCube 0.7.0.1 (from GitHub), CMake 3.15 or later, GNU make and Python 3.8 or later; see Get Started.

Once you know the steps, build_freertos.sh builds, flashes and opens the console in one go. It picks --chip-variant IPRO7AI from the application's configuration and opens the console at the application's own baud rate. With SDK firmware already running it sends reboot_dl first; for the very first flash, enter download mode with the keys:

export IPRO_FLASH_TOOL=<ICUBE>/ipro_iot_tool_macos
./build_freertos.sh -p /dev/cu.usbserial-XXXX \
    -P <ICUBE>/chips/ipro7/partition/partition_cfg_2M.toml \
    build flash monitor ipro7ai_reef_demo

The script cannot write boot2 or an mfg payload: flash the first ipro_ble_remote image and ipro_reef_teach with IntelProCube directly. Options are listed under Tool Command Lines.

Download mode¶

To be flashed, the IPRO7AI has to see BOOT (GPIO41) high when it comes out of reset; it then enters the ROM's download mode. In download mode the console is silent. After flashing, press SW2 to boot normally.

Enter download mode through the Debug Probe (one keyword per line):

python3 tools/serial_monitor.py /dev/cu.usbmodemXXXX02 --send IPRODL_1 --timeout 1
python3 tools/serial_monitor.py /dev/cu.usbmodemXXXX02 --send IPRORST_RESET --timeout 1

After flashing, send IPRODL_0 and IPRORST_RESET the same way and the board boots normally.

Images that use boot2 (for example the Reef build of ipro_ble_remote) also have reboot_usb [code]: it restarts into boot2's USB download mode (waiting indefinitely by default). boot2 also stops in this USB rescue mode when an OTA package fails its check.

Out-of-box firmware ipro7ai_reef_demo¶

Each block on the board has its own group of shell commands; help lists them all. The Reef has no LCD, so the camera is checked from the shell.

The AUX-IN input in the application's README (mic rec aux) belongs to the earlier carrier; V4.0 has no AUX-IN jack.

Camera bring-up order (SW7 on CAM):

cam probe        read the sensor ID over SCCB
cam start        start capture
cam status       run twice, one second apart: the frame count rises, the error count stays
cam bar on       switch to color bars
cam snap         the ASCII thumbnail shows vertical bands
cam bar off
cam snap         the real scene

Wi-Fi and RTSP camera stream¶

With the IPRO6S FIN card in the microSD socket, the Reef joins Wi-Fi over SDIO and serves an MJPEG stream of the camera over RTSP (rtsp://<ip>:8554/av0_0).

• FIN card firmware: the IPRO6S application ipro6_if_wifi, built with defconfig_ipro6_sdio:

  make -C apps/platform/ipro6_if_wifi DEFCONFIG=defconfig_ipro6_sdio   # build_ipro6_sdio/build_out/ipro6_if_wifi_IPRO6.bin
  

  How to update it is on the IPRO6S page; once the card is on Wi-Fi, ipro6s_ota <http url> at the Reef console updates it.

• Reef firmware: ipro7ai_reef_demo with defconfig_wifi_ipro6s:

  make -C apps/platform/ipro7ai_reef_demo DEFCONFIG=defconfig_wifi_ipro6s   # build_wifi_ipro6s/build_out/
  

• Switches: put JP3 on GPIO so that fin cycle can power-cycle the card.

At the console type ipronet_up <ssid> <psk>, then rtsp_cam on, and open rtsp://<ip>:8554/av0_0 in an RTSP player. The full walkthrough is Wi-Fi and RTSP Camera Stream.

Supported examples¶

These 9 applications (11 configurations) build and run on the Reef; each has an example page with the flash and run steps. Apart from ipro7ai_reef_demo, ipro_reef_teach and ipro_agora_sentino, a plain make builds another board: add DEFCONFIG= for the Reef.

A DEFCONFIG= build goes to build_<name>/build_out/, where the name is the file name without defconfig_: defconfig_reef builds into build_reef/.

USB identities¶

The Reef's USB-C carries the IPRO7AI's USB 2.0 Full-Speed device; what the host sees depends on the firmware. Every application uses VID 0x3896 (INTELPRO INC.).

ipro_ble_remote, ipro_throughput_test, ipro_le_audio_headset, ipro7_jpeg_decode, ipro_agora_sentino and the defconfig_wifi_ipro6s build of ipro7ai_reef_demo use no USB device; USB-C only powers the board.

Pin map¶

The microSD CMD and DAT lines have no external pull-ups, so enable the IPRO7AI's internal pull-ups (the SDK board configuration does). Before you switch the socket off with GPIO14, drive GPIO28–33 low or make them inputs. These pins go to the socket only, not to J_IO.

40-pin expansion header J_IO¶

J_IO is a 2 × 20, 2.54 mm vertical header in the same position and pin order as the Raspberry Pi 40-pin header: power, ground, I2C and UART are where you expect them. Odd pins are in the inner row, even pins along the board edge. All signals are 3.3 V, and every signal pin has ESD protection.

• Pins marked * go through the camera switches: they reach the IPRO7AI only with SW7 on GPIO and carry no signal with SW7 on CAM.
• The 5 V on pins 2 and 4 is USB 5 V through a diode. It is present only while USB-C is plugged in, and you cannot power the board through it.
• Pins 16 and 18 (BOOT, RESET) are not connected by default; fit 0 Ω resistors at R92 and R93 if you need them.
• Pins 27 and 28 are a second I2C bus; with SW7 on GPIO you can use them to read an ID EEPROM on an add-on board.

Debug connector U6¶

U6 is a 6-pin, 1.0 mm pitch right-angle connector (SH1.0) with the console UART and the BOOT and RESET lines, for flashing and for the boot log. The console is UART0, which is also the flashing UART: 115200 baud, 8N1, no flow control (921600 baud while flashing).

Connect the CN_UART connector of the IPRO Debug Probe to U6 with a cable whose pin order is reversed end to end: probe pin n goes to U6 pin 7 − n (probe RST to RESET, DL to BOOT, TXD to RX, RXD to TX, GND to GND, and the probe's 3V3 lands on the unconnected pin).

SDK board support¶

• Board selection: the .config sets CONFIG_IPRO7AI_REEF=y and CONFIG_BOARD="IPRO7AI_REEF"; the pin definitions are in bsp/board/ipro7/ipro7ai_reef_board_config.h. Do not also set CONFIG_EVB=y in the same configuration: with both, the build targets the IPRO7 EVB.
• PSRAM: the build does not apply Kconfig select, so every Reef configuration states CONFIG_USE_PSRAM=y explicitly (except the defconfig_reef of ipro_throughput_test, which leaves PSRAM off). Start a new application from a copy of apps/platform/ipro7ai_reef_demo/.config.
• Pin definitions: the BOARD_* pins for the console, USB, camera, speaker, microphones, LED, keys and SD card match this page. The comments in that file about the expansion header and jumpers describe the earlier (V3.0) carrier; for V4.0 this page is the reference.
• Crystal trim: when the .config does not set CONFIG_IPRO7_XTAL_CAPCODE, the build applies 95 for the Reef; set another value in .config to override it (0 keeps the value found at boot). The [XTAL] capcode line in the boot log shows the value in use.
• Flash layout: the Reef configurations of ipro7ai_reef_demo, ipro7_uvc_cam, ipro7_jpeg_decode and ipro_throughput_test link a 1 MB layout, which fits either in-package flash; the .config of ipro_reef_teach and ipro_agora_sentino and the defconfig_reef of ipro_ble_remote, ipro_le_audio_headset and ipro_ai_link set CONFIG_IPRO7_FLASH_2M=y. To give a 1 MB-layout application the whole 2 MB flash, add CONFIG_IPRO7_FLASH_2M=y to its configuration.
• Zephyr RTOS: this release has no Zephyr board for the Reef. The SoC Kconfig notes that a Reef can run ipro7_evb images with CONFIG_SOC_IPRO7_XTAL_CAPCODE=95; that use is not validated.

Related documents¶

• IPRO AI Teach: teach this board to recognize images, voices and sensor signals with IPRO AI Studio.
• Examples: the applications that run on the Reef, each with build, flash and run steps.
• Pinout & Peripheral Mapping, Power & Current Measurement, IPRO7AI, IPRO6S.
• apps/platform/ipro7ai_reef_demo/README.md: the out-of-box firmware's full command set and camera debugging notes.
• IPRO7AI Reef development kit user guide (V4.0 board hardware, interfaces and power) and IPRO Debug Probe user guide: available from INTELPRO, see Documents.