Release Notes Scarthgap 6.12 v2.0.0

Introduction

Astra™ is Synaptics’ new compute platform designed for the IoT market. It features a series of high-performance, AI-native, multi-modal SoCs optimized for consumer, enterprise, and industrial IoT workloads. These SoCs are equipped with hardware accelerators for edge inferencing, security, graphics, vision, and audio, and offer out-of-the-box functionality with Synaptics’ connectivity solutions.

Astra (v2.0.0) GA Release is a unified software development kit supporting the SL-Series of MPUs.

The high-level components included in this SDK are described below:

  • Upstream Linux Kernel and device tree.

  • Low-level Linux device drivers (U-BOOT) for peripheral devices.

  • Open source code for Multimedia pipelines.

  • Synaptics proprietary security approach.

  • Related SDK Documents

All of these items can be found through Synaptics’ and third parties open source Git repositories on GitHub.

Yocto SDK

The Yocto Project is an open-source collaboration project that provides templates, tools and methods for custom Linux-based systems for embedded and IoT products. By leveraging the power of the open-source development community, Synaptics hopes to provide its customers with a wider array of compatible software packages to build their products faster, with more features, while at the same time having the stability and support of a large open-source development project. Additionally, the SDK enables customers who already use a Yocto-based development environment to migrate to Synaptics class-leading silicon solutions for improved performance and additional functionality. The Yocto Project offers a vast number of software packages that provide many options.

Reference Board Supported Scope

Below table lists the supported ASTRA reference board (Machina) and supported scope.

SOC / Reference Board

Test Validation and Support Scope

SL1680 Core board + IO board

GA

SL1640 Core board + IO board

GA

SL1620 Core board + IO board

GA

License

Using the Astra Software Developer Kit and BSP requires complying with the ASTRA EMBEDDED SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT KIT LICENSE AGREEMENT –.

Synaptics Proprietary TAs

The following Trusted Applications (TAs) are Synaptics proprietary TAs which run in the OP-TEE Trusted Execution Environment. They are provided in binary format. Synaptics will migrate them into REE and open source the code to the public in a near future releases.

Package

Notes

SyNAP

TA

SL1680 / SL1640 / SL1620

Note

The Vmeta TA was open sourced in release v1.6. Source code can be found at https://github.com/synaptics-astra/tee-optee_dev/tree/scarthgap_6.12_v2.0.0/ta/vpu.

Note

FastLogo and DHUB TAs were open sourced in release v1.7.

Where to get the SDK from GitHub

Images and Toolchains

https://github.com/synaptics-astra/sdk/releases/

SDK

https://github.com/synaptics-astra/sdk/tree/scarthgap_6.12_v2.0.0

Documentation

Getting Started

Astra Machina Eval Platform

Astra Yocto Linux Developer Guide

Astra Yocto Linux User Guide

For other collaterals please refer to the Synaptics Customer Portal.

New Features

Common New Features

Feature

SoC

Description

OOBE Recipes

All

Added recipes to enable the Out-of-Box-Experience image.

SU-Boot for USB

All

Suppport Synaptics U-Boot when booting from USB.

Enable SWUpdate

All

Enable support for OTA using SWUpdate.

Enable SyNAP

All

Enable support for using SyNAP framework with the NPU.

Enable Gstreamer AI Pipelines

All

Support SyNAP based gstreamer plugins.

Bluetooth SCO

All

Added support for Bluetooth SCO link.

Support MP Flow

All

Support provisioning for mass production.

SELinux

All

SELinux is supported (disabled by default).

Boot from SD Card

All

Add support for booting from SD Card.

Building with Dash Shell

All

Update build scripts work with Dash.

SL1620 New Features

No SL1620 specific features were added in this release.

SL1640 New Features

Feature

SoC

Description

V4L2 AV1 Decoder

SL1640 and SL1680

Support V4l2 AV1 Decoder.

SL1680 New Features

Feature

SoC

Description

V4L2 AV1 Decoder

SL1640 and SL1680

Support V4l2 AV1 Decoder.

Dual ISP Sensor Support

SL1680

Add suport for dual ISP sensors.

HDMI-RX Hotplug

SL1680

Support hot plugging on HDMI-RX.

SoC Core Feature Summary

This section summarizes the hardware features of Astra Machina SoCs.

Feature

SoC

2D and 3D Graphics with GPU

SL1620, SL1640, and SL1680

DRM-KMS

SL1620, SL1640, and SL1680

Multi-standard Video Encoding/Decoding

SL1640 and SL1680

Cortex-M core boot

SL1620, SL1640, and SL1680

HIFI4 DSP

SL1640

NPU

SL1640 and SL1680

Security for CPU, BOOT, and DRM engine

SL1620, SL1640, and SL1680

MIPI CSI & ISP

SL1680

Specific Modules and Features

Feature Modules

Feature Items

SL1620

SL1640

SL1680

Comment

GST Audio Pipeline

GST Audio Pipeline

Y

Y

Y

BT A2DP Audio

Y

Y

Y

PDM MIC Support

Y

N/A

N/A

SW Decoding Capability

Y

Y

Y

  • Supported formats: AAC, MP2, MP3, Vobis, AC3, OPUS

File Playback

Y

Y

Y

  • Supported formats: TS, MP3, MP4, Webm

GST Sample Rate Conversion & Mixing

Y

Y

Y

  • Limitation on SL1620 audio mixing. Sample Rate conversion is fine.

HDMI-RX (Audio)

N/A

N/A

Y

Volume Control for USB audio devices

Y

Y

Y

Supports volume control of USB audio devices using GPIOs

GST Video Pipeline

HDMI Rx Video Path to Display Sink

N/A

N/A

Y

  • MultiView: Camera + Video OR multi Video

  • Dual display means the output simultaneously

  • Dual display for SL1680 means HDMI-TX + MIPI-DSI

  • Dual display for SL1620 means MIPI-DSI + RGB

RTSP stream with V4L2 playback

N/A

Y

Y

Multiview RTSP Playback

N/A

N/A

Y

Support Wayland Sink Window Dragging with mouse

Y

Y

Y

Multi View

N/A

N/A

Y

Video Decode with 2K Wayland Sink

Y

Y

Y

FFMPEG Decode

Y

Y

Y

V4L2 Decode

N/A

Y

Y

Dual Display

Y

N/A

Y

Video Decode with QT Applications

Y

Y

Y

Multi-playback only on SL1680

GST AI

OpenCV Support

Y

Y

Y

Multistream AI with RTSP

N/A

N/A

Y

AI support for ISP Camera

N/A

N/A

Y

GST AI Support for GPU models

Y

N/A

N/A

Pose Estimation

Y

Y

Y

Image Classification

Y

Y

Y

Single View AI use case

Y

Y

Y

Multi View AI user case

N/A

N/A

Y

  • SL680 supports multi-view AI case

  • SL1640/1620 only supports single view AI case

Super Resolution AI use case

N/A

N/A

Y

Face Recognition use case

N/A

N/A

Y

SR Slideshow

N/A

N/A

Y

SyNAP

Y

Y

Y

  • supports SyNAP pre-process and sink

HDMI-RX

HDMI-RX 4K

N/A

N/A

Y

DHUB TA in OP-TEE

N/A

N/A

Y

HDIM-Rx Video 2K all formats support

N/A

N/A

Y

GST Pipeline Support

N/A

N/A

Y

HDMI-Rx Driver for Video – 2K60

N/A

N/A

Y

YUYV and NV12 formats as VIP output

N/A

N/A

Y

EDID Support

N/A

N/A

Y

VIP Scalar

N/A

N/A

Y

RGB, YUV444/422/420 – 12/10/8 bit input

N/A

N/A

Y

Gstreamer v4l2src pipeline to Display

N/A

N/A

Y

DRM-KMS

Fastlogo with OP-TEE

Y

Y

Y

Supports both HDMI and MIPI

HDMI Hot Plug Detect and Dynamic Resolution Change

N/A

Y

Y

EDID parsing

N/A

Y

Y

MIPI, HDMI on Astra Machina boards

Y

Y

Y

  • SL1620 /SL1640 supports either HDMI or MIPI output.

  • SL1680 supports HDMI and MIPI simultaneously.

    Default is HDMI, can be changes to MIPI via DTS

Display

Wayland Display Server

Y

Y

Y

V4L2 ISP

Dual / Single Sensor V4L2 ISP Driver

N/A

N/A

Y

  • ISP feature is only for SL1680

  • Known limitation of Downscaling of inputs: YUV420 SP 10bit and RGB 888

Support for 4K input and output

N/A

N/A

Y

Support for downscaling of the inputs

N/A

N/A

Y

Support cropping in ISP down scaler

N/A

N/A

Y

Supports Bayer and RGB formats

N/A

N/A

Y

Support Simultaneous Path Playback w/ Single Sensor

N/A

N/A

Y

Direct Sensor(MCM) output for ISP bypass

N/A

N/A

Y

U-Boot

EMMC HS400 support

Y

Y

Y

SL1620 1G DDR4 x 16 support

Y

N/A

N/A

DVFS Support

Y

Y

Y

VCPU DVFS can be supported on SL1620/SL1640/SL1680

VCORE DVFS is only supported on SL1640

U-BOOT v1.1.1

Y

Y

Y

Release Notes

General peripherals support

Y

Y

Y

  • Supports USB2.0 devices

  • Supports USB3.0 host

  • Supports Ethernet

  • Supports SPI Flash

Boot mode: from eMMC

Y

Y

Y

  • Support eMMC HS400 mode

Boot mode: from SD-CARD

Y

Y

Y

Image Upgrade

Y

Y

Y

  • Supports eMMC image upgrade with USB U-Boot,

    SPI U-Boot and SU-Boot

  • Supports SD card image upgrade with SPI U-Boot and

    SU-Boot

  • USB U-Boot: image via TFTP and USB target

    (connected to PC)

  • SPI U-Boot: image via TFTP and USB Host

    (connected to USB Disk)

  • SU-Boot: image via TFTP and USB Host

    (connected to USB Disk)

  • Supports sparse image slices (Yocto will generate

    sparse image automatically).

Low Power Standby

N/A

Y

Y

OP-TEE

OP-TEE enabled

Y

Y

Y

WIFI

WIFI 6 & WIFI 6E

Y

Y

Y

wpa_supplicant 2.11

Host AP mode using hostapd

Y

Y

Y

Bluetooth

Supported

Y

Y

Y

General Modules, Peripherals, and Interfaces Supported

General

Kernel

Kernel Version 6.12.11

Yocto

Scarthgap: 5.0.9

U-Boot

SPI U-Boot version: v1.1.1

USB SU-Boot version: v1.7

*Synaptics U-Boot based on U-Boot 2025.01

USB Tool

astra-update: 1.0.5

OP-TEE

OP-TEE version: 4.5.0

Gstreamer (GST)

GST version: 1.22.12

ISP Firmware

version: 6.5.1

Memory

Memory - DDR

SL1620

DDR3

1GB 1866 Mbps

2GB 1866 Mbps

4GB 1866 Mbps

DDR4

1GB 2133 Mbps

2GB 2133 Mbps

4GB 2133 Mbps

DDR4x16

1GB 2133 Mbps

2GB 2133 Mbps

SL1640

DDR4

1GB 3200 Mbps

2GB 2400 / 2666 / 3200 Mbps

4GB 3200 Mbps

DDRx16

1GB 3200 Mbps

2GB 3200 Mbps

LPDDR4

2GB 3733 Mbps

3GB 3733 Mbps

4GB 3733 Mbps

LPDDR4x

3733 Mbps

3GB 3733 Mbps

4GB 3733 Mbps

SL1680

LPDDR4

2GB 3733 Mbps

3GB 3733 Mbps

4GB 3733 Mbps

LPDDR4x

2GB 3200 / 3733 Mbps

3GB 3200 / 3733 Mbps

4GB 3733 Mbps

Memory - eMMC

up to 32GB

General Peripherals

Interrupt

GIC

Clock

Controls the system frequency and clock tree distribution

Timer

GPIO

GPIO is initialized in earlier phase according to hardware design

SDMA

Conforms to the DMA engine framework

UART

USB 2.0 (OTG)

USB 3.0 (Host)

I2C

SPI

Network

Ethernet

SL1620: 10 / 100 / 1000 Mbps

SL1640: 10 / 100 Mbps

SL1680: 10 /100 / 1000 Mbps

Wireless Connectivity

Supports WIFI & BT

GPU and Display

GPU

  • DDK 24.2@6643903

  • OpenGL ES 3.2

  • Mesa 24.0.7

  • libdrm 2.4.120

  • Weston 13.0.1

Direct Rendering Manager (DRM)

Display

RGB Parallel Output

Supported on SL1620

HDMI-TX

Supported on SL1620/SL1640/SL1680

HDMI-RX

Supported on SL1680

MIPI-DSI

SL1680/SL1640/SL1620. On SL1640 it needs to be enabled via DTS

Camera

MIPI-CSI

SL1680

ISP

SL1680

Audio Interfaces

PDM

SL1620

SPDIF

None

I2S

SL1620, SL1640, SL1680

Supported Camera Modules

Sensor

Module

Resolution

Interface (Device Tree Overlay if Required)

Notes

IMX258

Synaptics IMX258 Camera Module

3840x2160 30fps (mode 0)

1920x1080 30fps (mode 1)

MIPI-CSI 0 w/ dolphin-csi0-with-expander.dtbo

Synaptics SL1680 MIPI CSI Adaptor Board Required

IMX415

Synaptics IMX415 Camera Module

3840x2160 30fps (mode 0)

1920x1080 30fps (mode 1)

MIPI-CSI 0 w/ dolphin-csi0-with-expander.dtbo

Synaptics SL1680 MIPI CSI Adaptor Board Required

OV5647

Arducam 5MP OV5647 Camera Module

640x480 60fps (mode 0)

1920x1080 30fps (mode 1)

MIPI-CSI0

1920x1080 30fps output is non-calibrated

MIPI-CSI 1 w/ dolphin-csi1-without-expander.dtbo

IMX477

Raspberry Pi High Quality Camera

3840x2160 30fps (mode 0)

MIPI-CSI0

Single Sensor Support Only

3840x2160 30fps output is non-calibrated

MIPI-CSI 1 w/ dolphin-csi1-without-expander.dtbo

Known Issues and Limitations

Note

Versions of U-Boot included in the Astra SDK v0.9.0 release are not compatible with Astra SDK releases v1.0 or later. Please ensure that you are using USB Tool v1.0 or later when flashing using USB. Or U-Boot v1.0.0 or later when updating with internal SPI flash. See Updating Internal SPI Flash Images using U-Boot for instructions on updating the internal SPI flash.

Note

U-Boot version v1.1.0 improves emmc flash times significantly. We recommend updating to U-Boot v1.1.0 to benefit from these improvements.

Note

SD Boot with release v1.3 and later requires updating to U-Boot v1.1.1 or later. See Updating Internal SPI Flash Images using U-Boot for instructions on updating the internal SPI flash.

Note

In Astra v1.3, the default display output for the SL1620 is set to HDMI via a DSI-to-HDMI conversion. Starting with Astra v1.4, the onboard DSI-to-HDMI converter for the SL1620 Rev D core module has been enabled. For older core modules, an external DSI-to-HDMI adapter board is required. The default display output can be switched to MIPI by following the instructions provided in the User Guides. Haier Panel Configuration Guide and Waveshare Panel Configuration Guide.

Note

In Astra v1.4, the default MIPI display on SL1680 was changed to the Waveshare 7” Panel.

Note

In Astra v1.4, ISP IOMMU only supports the NV12 format. When using RGB888 format, set the v4l2src parameters extra-controls="c,mmu_enable=0" to disable IOMMU.

Note

In Astra v1.5, the rootfs partition sizes increased to accommodate the extra packages in the OOBE images. This interferes with OTA since SWUpdate expects the rootfs partition size to be the same. To perform OTA on a system with v1.4 installed, please build an image using v1.4’s partition sizes. (See eMMC Partition Customization on Astra Machina)

Note

Network Manager can be supported in Astra 1.7, but it’s disabled by default as there are some stability issues found. If needed, Network Manager can be enabled. Please, contact the Synaptics Astra support team for more information.

Note

SyNAP AI features are NOT currently available in the Astra Scarthgap v2.0.0 Alpha release. SyNAP will be included in a future release.

Known Issues

SL1620

SL1640

SL1680

Module

ID

Summary

Y

N/A

N/A

Gstreamer Pipeline

36035

Camera display flickers and then crashes after 2 - 3 mins of 2K output with 4K USB Camera.

Y

N/A

N/A

Audio

29228

arecord prints “Sample format is non-available” when recording DMIC input set to

16 and 24.

Y

N/A

N/A

Chromium

31549

Microsoft Teams participant video is not visible when using the Chromium browser.

Y

N/A

N/A

Display

34580

Observed garbage output on TFT panel after reboot.

Y

N/A

N/A

Display

34979

Inverted colors observed when playing secret_640x480.264 with live555MediaServer on TFT Panel.

Y

N/A

N/A

Gstreamer Pipeline

35025

No Audio observed while playing WEBM file with playbin.

Y

Y

Y

Linux Kernel

35126

Framebuffer Console is unresponsive.

Y

N/A

N/A

Power Management

35192

HDMI display shows garbage when doing Suspend / Resume.

Y

Y

Y

Graphics

35221

The library libvulkan.so.1 is missing.

Y

N/A

N/A

Display

35376

Observed corrupted output when pushing frame to GFX1 and PIP planes @AR24.

Y

N/A

N/A

Display

35522

Garbage observed while doing reboot.

Y

N/A

N/A

Linux Kernel

35584

Ethernet not working after Wake On Lan.

Y

N/A

N/A

BT and WiFi

35662

No WiFi of Bluetooth observed in Settings.

Y

N/A

N/A

Gstreamer Pipeline

35803

Freezes and gray screen observed during FFMPEG decoding test with IP camera.

Y

N/A

N/A

Audio

35805

Observed corrupted files while recording DMIC cases with 32bit / 24bit / 16bit PCM

with AAC content.

Y

N/A

N/A

Linux Kernel

35817

New windows open in the background it not opened fullscreen.

Y

N/A

N/A

Display

35865

Weston dual display application control is not working.

Y

N/A

N/A

Display

35866

Wrong colors observed while playing MP4_AVC_AC3.mp4 on TFT panel.

Y

N/A

N/A

U-Boot

35972

Garbaged observed on TFT display when booting from internal SPI flash.

Y

N/A

N/A

Gstreamer Pipeline

35981

Labels are not being displayed when doing image classification using FFMPEG.

Y

N/A

N/A

Video Player Demo

35982

Syna Video Player UI has incorrect alignment.

Y

N/A

N/A

Gstreamer Pipeline

35990

Error displayed when recording with a USB mic.

“WARNING: erroneous pipeline: could not link audioconvert0 to avenc_mp2-0”

Y

N/A

N/A

OOBE

35992

FingerPaint demo is not working as expected.

Y

N/A

N/A

OOBE

35993

Observed video freeze when playing URL streams using Syna Dash Player.

Y

N/A

N/A

OOBE

35994

GFX Demo app UI goes to background when opening.

Y

N/A

N/A

Audio

35995

Observed corrupted files while recording USB mic cases with 8KHz / 16KHz / 44KHz

/48KHz with AAC content.

Y

N/A

N/A

Gstreamer Pipeline

35997

Observed stuck video while testing RTSP decodebin H264 Case.

Y

N/A

N/A

Display

35998

Applications open on TFT panel when started on the 7.1 MIPI panel.

N/A

Y

N/A

OOBE

36032

Available WiFi networks dropdown jumps to first position when scrolling down.

N/A

Y

Y

Display

35749

Observed video has slight frame drop when playing VP9 encoded video at 3840x2026

and vorbis audio track.

N/A

Y

N/A

Linux Kernel

35778

Ethernet interface randomly fails to get IP address address after reboot.

N/A

Y

Y

Gstreamer Pipeline

35944

Video does not play smoothly when running multi-display testcase.

N/A

Y

N/A

Linux Kernel

35948

Reboot is delayed at “A stop job is running for Modem Manager” for a few minutes.

N/A

Y

N/A

OOBE

35949

The video mixer use case does not fill the whole screen.

N/A

N/A

Y

Gstreamer Pipeline

36031

Super Resolution use case is displaying a horizontal line when using a camera when

super resolution is disabled.

N/A

N/A

Y

OOBE

33670

Getting Started Video Stream won’t finish unless you move mouse after clicking

close.

N/A

N/A

Y

ISP

34950

Output shows green and noise artifacts when testing OV5647 sensor.

Y

Y

Y

Fastlogo

35039

Fastlogo TA and AVIO failed while suspending.

N/A

N/A

Y

Graphics

35143

Unexpected output on HDMI display after stopping weston.

N/A

N/A

Y

Gstreamer Pipeline

35288

Video shakes when playing 4 videos using Syna Video Player with V4L2 decoding.

Y

Y

Y

SyNAP

35470

35482

35788

Lots of warnings in the serial console with “__get_user_pages” message when running

SyNAP.

N/A

N/A

Y

HDMI-RX

35502

Channel mapping is wrong when testing audio with QD980 4K30 RGB at 1080p30Hz

with NV12 & 48k, S32_LE,8 channel using alsasink.

N/A

N/A

Y

HDMI-RX

35507

Audio glitch can be heard when testing UYVY format with HDMI-RX playback and dump.

N/A

Y

Y

SyNAP

35510

Some usecases report an error when running offline tests.

N/A

N/A

Y

HDMI-RX

35511

HDMI-RX output is displayed partially on HDMI and MIPI displays when doing HDMI-TX

hotplug testing.

N/A

N/A

Y

ISP

35770

Screen shows garbage flash at the beginning of test when testing IMX415 sensors

main and sp2 paths.

N/A

N/A

Y

ISP

35792

Display shows excessive green when testing OV5647 sensor with 1080P output.

N/A

N/A

Y

ISP

35797

Display shows excessive blue when testing IMX477 with CSI-0 and CSI-1 port.

N/A

N/A

Y

ISP

35815

Display shows excessive purple when testing IMX477 in dark environments.

N/A

N/A

Y

Display

35912

Weston dual display application control can not work.

N/A

N/A

Y

HDMI-RX

35965

Met error print during HDMI-RX audio playback.

N/A

N/A

Y

Display

35966

Waveshare 7.1 inch MIPI panel screen shaking when disable / enable Weston service.