Deploy a Rockchip EtherCAT System

Rockchip Platform Support

Set the CPU to performance mode:

for governor in /sys/devices/system/cpu/cpufreq/policy*/scaling_governor; do
  echo performance | sudo tee "$governor"
done

Confirm the bus before starting the application:

ethercat slaves
ethercat pdos
ethercat cstruct
sudo ./ethercat_app

Products with two GMACs can dedicate one interface to EtherCAT and retain the other for standard Ethernet. For example:

gmac0 → EtherCAT IgH
gmac1 → TCP/IP, SSH, and standard network services

The reference RK3568 device tree marks the EtherCAT GMAC with a dedicated compatible string:

gmac0: ethernet@fe2a0000 {
    compatible = "rockchip,rk3568-gmac-ethercat", "snps,dwmac-4.20a";
    reg = <0x0 0xfe2a0000 0x0 0x10000>;
};

When using two interfaces:

main_devices must contain the MAC address of the EtherCAT interface, not the standard network interface.
Do not configure an IP address on the EtherCAT interface or allow NetworkManager to manage it.
Continue using the standard stmmac driver for the standard network interface.
The device tree, clocks, resets, PHYs, and pinctrl for both GMACs must be configured correctly and independently.
The dedicated compatible string and driver support depend on the corresponding SDK patches and cannot be used directly with an unadapted kernel.