Increasing envelope memory for long random waveform generation on ZCU111

[bmnoh]

Hi all,

I am currently using QICK on a ZCU111 RFSoC board.

I would like to generate a long Gaussian-random amplitude waveform using the RF-DACs. However, my QICK configuration shows that each signal generator has an envelope memory of 65,536 complex samples, which is shorter than the waveform length I would like to use.

My setup is:

• Board: ZCU111
• QICK version: 0.2.401
• Signal generator: axis_signal_gen_v6
• Envelope memory: 65,536 complex samples
• Target waveform: Gaussian-random amplitude waveform

I would like to ask:

1. Is this envelope memory limit mainly determined by the standard QICK firmware/IP configuration?
2. Is there any way to increase this memory size?
3. Would using a higher-level RFSoC board such as ZCU216 or ZCU208 increase the available waveform memory, or would a different waveform generation method be required?

Any advice would be very helpful.

Thank you.

[meeg]

1. Yes, it's entirely determined by the configuration of this firmware.
2. It's possible to recompile the firmware with larger memory, but subject to FPGA resource limitations. A factor of 2 or 4 is probably fine, more is probably not possible. Depending on your use case, it's possible that a different generator IP will do what you want with more efficient use of the FPGA. But in either case, we don't recommend modifying the firmware unless you already have experience, since the learning curve is beyond what we can help you with.
3. All RFSoCs have the same FPGA logic resources, the only difference is in the RF-DACs and RF-ADCs.