SDAA352 May   2026 TDA4VM

 

  1.   1
  2.   Abstract
  3.   Trademarks
  4. 1Introduction
  5. 2System Architecture
    1. 2.1 Core Configuration
    2. 2.2 Power Domain Architecture
    3. 2.3 IPC Framework Overview
  6. 3Heartbeat Monitoring Design
    1. 3.1 Ping-Pong Protocol
    2. 3.2 Dual-Task Architecture
    3. 3.3 Crash Detection Logic
  7. 4 Recovery Mechanism
    1. 4.1 Power State Transitions
  8. 5 Implementation Details
    1. 5.1 Configuration Parameters
    2. 5.2 Parameter Tuning Guidance:
    3. 5.3 Linux-Side rpmsg_char Implementation
  9. 6 Test Results and Performance
    1. 6.1 Timing Profile
    2. 6.2 Recovery Verification
  10. 7Summary
  11. 8References

Abstract

Automotive and industrial systems using heterogeneous multi-core processors require high reliability with automatic fault detection and recovery capabilities. The TI TDA4x System-on-Chip (SoC) contains multiple processing cores including ARM Cortex-A72, Cortex-R5F, and C7x DSP cores that must operate continuously without manual intervention. This application note describes the implementation of an inter-core heartbeat monitoring system using the Inter-Processor Communication (IPC) driver and Low Power Management (LPM) driver on the TDA4x platform. The solution provides real-time monitoring of all remote cores via a ping-pong protocol, automatic crash detection within configurable time windows, and autonomous recovery through MCU Only Mode power cycling. Test results demonstrate total recovery time of approximately 1.2 seconds, which is faster than a full system power cycle. This document provides the theory, implementation details, and test results to enable engineers to implement similar fault-tolerant designs in TDA4x based systems.