Uzebox burn-in tester

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Jubatian
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Uzebox burn-in tester

Post by Jubatian »

So this is a Uzebox burn-in tester which will really drive the ATMega nuts :)

It is based on a complex self-test library I am developing for various things (such a library is useful in critical applications where it is essential to know whether the CPU is still capable to operate correctly), but that is also useful for testing Uzebox, to check whether the system can withstand overclocking.

The repository is here: https://github.com/Jubatian/uzeburn , binaries are attached.

When fully completed, it will cover fairly well the whole ALU of the ATMega, the ROM (correctness of code within it) and RAM, and registers critical for code execution. Currently what it lacks is most notably the mul instruction variants and very few others (such as bld, bst, cbi and sbi).

On a good ATMega with good flashing, you should see something like this:
UzeBurn screenshot
UzeBurn screenshot
screenshot.png (15.41 KiB) Viewed 9700 times
If it finds some problem, a box will turn red, then later yellow if the test can pass (indicating a transient effect). The meaning of each box can be acquired by looking it up in the XMBurner library.

In particular this also can detect if you have a poor SD card or connection (and so the current bootloader may fail writing a correct binary) as it checks the ROM (by CRC). Normally then (if it can even start) the CRC field will display an error after a few passes (it needs more passes to cover the complete ROM), but other tests may also fail if their code became broken by the failing upload.

If anyone has ATMega1284's, those could also be interesting.

Note that if you try to flash a new version of this program with the current bootloader, it will fail since it recognizes it by CRC32. All versions of this program will have the same CRC32 since the binary itself already has one on its end! (and including that in packrom's CRC calculation will result the CRC32 "magic value").
Attachments
uzeburn.hex
Hex file
(165.05 KiB) Downloaded 460 times
uzeburn.uze
UzeRom file
(60.5 KiB) Downloaded 471 times
Last edited by Jubatian on Mon Oct 16, 2017 8:33 am, edited 3 times in total.
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Artcfox
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Re: Uzebox burn-in tester

Post by Artcfox »

This looks like a nice tool!

I let it run for a few minutes on my original Uzebox kit version, and everything stayed green. I tried flashing it a second time, and it still stayed green. :)
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Jubatian
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Re: Uzebox burn-in tester

Post by Jubatian »

I let it going for about six hours on mine, it is stable. That was that Uzebox which I originally got from Alec. He sent me another recently (an E-Uzebox), however as of now its SD socket is so weak I can not get it to flash correctly (usually neither any game, it needs luck to get something started). With some luck I can get a flashing where only the CRC module complains for the bad CRC, then it seems stable (so the AVR itself should be all right). I still need a better display for it, though, for some reason my TV stretches it vertically out of the screen (a lot), so it isn't very useful right now. Guess just needs a bit of soldering work later :)
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D3thAdd3r
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Re: Uzebox burn-in tester

Post by D3thAdd3r »

This is very useful. Nice especially when someone is trying to figure out issues with their Uzebox, they can rapidly eliminate the possibility of overclocking problems. I was wondering about some 1284s so this will help me a lot with that 8-)
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ry755
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Re: Uzebox burn-in tester

Post by ry755 »

Cool little utility! I tested it on my breadboard Uzebox and, unfortunately, it still has some problems reading the sd card. At least it's better than it was before.

*image removed*
Last edited by ry755 on Fri May 01, 2020 9:30 am, edited 1 time in total.
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D3thAdd3r
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Re: Uzebox burn-in tester

Post by D3thAdd3r »

@ry755
Do you have an ISP that you can directly flash the tool with to rule out corrupted program data? I would be interested to see if the tool is actually detecting a '644 that isn't overclockable(at least without overvolt).
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Jubatian
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Re: Uzebox burn-in tester

Post by Jubatian »

D3thAdd3r wrote: Sat Oct 07, 2017 11:55 pmI would be interested to see if the tool is actually detecting a '644 that isn't overclockable(at least without overvolt).
I would be interested to know! It should be able to, at least the underlaying library is sufficiently well tested with fault simulation (it has a large automated test environment using a modified emulator). I wonder how an ATMega1284 would fail in particular, possibly this tool can reveal how those chips actually behave when tried on the Uzebox PCB (maybe it would be possible to have 1284 based reliable Uzeboxes using this tool to select chips which can be made running stable enough for gaming).

Eh, I am not much into actual hardware (lacking the skills for that), if someone has access to various chips (maybe even suspicious ones) and could adjust the voltage, it could be interesting!
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ry755
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Re: Uzebox burn-in tester

Post by ry755 »

D3thAdd3r wrote: Sat Oct 07, 2017 11:55 pm @ry755
Do you have an ISP that you can directly flash the tool with to rule out corrupted program data? I would be interested to see if the tool is actually detecting a '644 that isn't overclockable(at least without overvolt).
With an ISP it still shows the errors. I even tried a different 644. Still shows errors! :x
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ry755
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Re: Uzebox burn-in tester

Post by ry755 »

Wait a minute... I tried the .hex and the .uze in uzem, and they both show the same errors! Do I just have really bad luck, or is the uploaded file corrupted?
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Re: Uzebox burn-in tester

Post by D3thAdd3r »

I thought Uzem can't run a bootloader at all...I don't even remember actually. Use CUzeBox, it has seen way more development in recent years and is pretty much the gold standard of Uzebox emulation now.
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