Nexys Video HDMI Demo

(Insert flowchart of display buffers here)

The Nexys Video HDMI Demo project demonstrates usage of the Nexys Video's HDMI in and HDMI out ports. . The behavior is as follows:

• A menu is displayed over UART at 115200 baud.
• There are 3 video buffers that can hold video data, as well as an input pointer and an output pointer.
• The input pointer chooses which display buffer to write to (Test pattern or input stream from HDMI in).
• The output pointer chooses which display buffer to display through the HDMI out port.
• The output resolution is controlled independent from the input data. This output resolution can be changed using the menu.

NOTE: The drawing functions (Functions 3, 4, 7, and 8) were designed for the Zynq processor. In its current state, these functions run VERY slowly on the Microblaze processor, so it is advised not to use these functions for the time being. It is possible that the floating point calculations are slowing these functions down. This should be fixed in a later release.

• Basic familiarity with SDK

• Nexys Video FPGA board
• 2 Micro-USB cables
• Nexys Video Power Supply
• 2 HDMI cables
• HDMI compatible Monitor

• Vivado Design Suite 2016.4
  • The project must be generated in 2016.4
• Xilinx SDK 2016.4
  • Newer/older versions can be used, but the procedure may vary slightly

• Nexys Video Support Files
  • These files will describe GPIO interfaces on your board and make it easier to select your FPGA board and add GPIO IP blocks.
  • Follow the Wiki guide: Vivado Board Files for Digilent 7-Series FPGA Boards on how to install Board Support Files for Vivado.

Nexys Video HDMI Demo Repository – ZIP GIT Repo

Follow the Using Digilent Github Demo Projects Tutorial. Since this is a Vivado SDK Project, you can either directly launch SDK and import the hardware handoff, or you can generate a bitstream in Vivado before launching SDK. Select the hardware handoff options in the tutorial if you don't want to modify the project block design later. Return to this guide when prompted to check for additional hardware requirements and setup.

Plug one end of one of your HDMI cable into your monitor and the other into the Nexys Video's HDMI OUT port. Plug the other HDMI cable into your computer and the HDMI IN port.

To see the UART communication channel, open a terminal program on your computer set to 112500 baud rate, 8 data bits, no parity bit and 1 stop bit. On startup, the Nexys Video will display the HDMI settings menu, shown below.

With the UART communication channel set up, when the program starts up you should see the following menu.

The output resolution is changed independently from the input resolution. You can choose the output resolution in this menu.

Selecting option 2 will cycle between the 3 frame buffers to output to the monitor.

Selecting these will print a test pattern on the selected input video frame buffer.

This option will start or stop the video data stream from the HDMI input. When streaming, the HDMI input data will be displayed on the current video frame buffer.

This option will change the buffer that video input will stream into.

This option will grab the current frame from the HDMI input and invert the colors. The inverted frame will be output on the following display buffer.

This option will grab the current frame from the HDMI input and scale it to the current output resolution.