October 9, 2013. Designers of microservers based on the new Intel C2000 Atom SoC will be able to debug software and firmware using tools in ASSET InterTech's Arium SourcePoint debugger. In addition, designers of applications like networking systems, imaging, high-performance computing, gaming, and media processing that are based on multicore Texas Instruments KeyStone II processors can use the set of software and firmware debugging tools in ASSET's Arium SourcePoint debugger for ARM.
With regard to the latter, Larry Osborn, ASSET product manager for Arium tools, said, “Software bugs are always hard to track down and trace in multicore environments. For developers to keep pace with today’s demanding design schedules, they really have to have debug tools that take advantage and extend the capabilities of the on-chip resources in ARM cores.”
To serve the needs of different types of design teams that may be developing a wide range of applications, two ASSET Arium run-control probes support the SourcePoint ARM debugger.
The LC-500S is a cost-effective run-control probe for debugging ARM code for the KeyStone II architecture. SourcePoint on the LC-500S supports TI’s Embedded Trace Buffer and takes advantage of ARM’s Program Trace Macrocell (PTM) and System Trace Macrocell (STM) capabilities. The SourcePoint ARM debugger provides extensive post-capture analytics, results graphing and search functionality
The LX-1000 Trace Port Analyzer supports extensive external storage of two gigabytes for trace results. Software and firmware engineers can thoroughly and effectively examine the trace results stored in the LX-1000 to identify the precise location of the cause of a bug in the code. Post-processing capabilities such as statistical tabulation and others are synchronized with SoucePoint’s line-by-line code display of trace results.
The Arium tools will also be available as part of the ScanWorks platform in its test and validation toolset.
ASSET’s SoucePoint ARM debugger for TI’s KeyStone II architecture is available now from ASSET InterTech and its distributors. Solutions start at $4,950.
Debugging C2000 Atom Code
The increased complexity of the C2000 Atom architecture can be challenging to software engineers who are trying to debug code and still meet critical deadlines on a development schedule, said Osborn. Because the C2000 Atom brings datacenter-class capabilities to low-power storage and server applications, system providers will want to get their new microservers to market as quickly as possible. These tools will help.”
The new Intel C2000 Atom devices are low-power SoCs featuring two, four, or eight processing cores as well as several peripheral interfaces, including USB2, Gigabit Ethernet, and Serial Advanced Technology Attachment (SATA).
The SourcePoint debugger is able to quickly locate code bugs and provide extensive trace visibility into software and firmware execution. With the help of SourcePoint, engineers are able to efficiently identify and determine the root causes of performance issues, failures or crashes.
To serve the needs of a wide range of application development teams, the SourcePoint debugger executes on two Arium run-control probes, the LX-1000 and the ECM-XDP3. Arium's ECM-XDP3 is a cost-effective yet powerful run-control probe that provides the same analytics, search functions, and graphic capabilities as the LX-1000.
SourcePoint debug software for designs based on the C2000 Atom processor is available now from ASSET InterTech and its distributors. Pricing for SourcePoint with an ECM-XDP3 run-control probe starts at $11,800.