Altera Flex10K, EPF10K10LC84 dev board

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My problem is that the flex10K board has a jtag port but i can't recognize the device if i put my usb blaster cable on it.

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What version of Quartus are you using?

If you want to synthesize for the FLEX10K devices, you need to install 9.0SP2.

I think the latest version of Quartus should still recognize a FLEX10K device, even if it will not let you synthesize a design for it. Have you tried using the JTAG debugger to read the IDCODE?

How have you wired your USB-Blaster into the FLEX10K board? You comment that the board has a byte-blaster circuit built into it. Did you connect your USB-Blaster to the inputs to this byte-blaster circuit, or did you remove it, and attach the USB-Blaster directly to the FPGA JTAG pins?

The USB-Blaster power for its internal buffer comes from the target, so you need to make sure you have that connected.

Cheers,

Dave

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What version of Quartus are you using?

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Hi

i am using the last one, Quartus v11, but i also have here a copy of an old Quartus version 9 (with license), i will install into a virtual machine tomorrow.

maybe it's a support missing problem by the new Altera software ?

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Have you tried using the JTAG debugger to read the IDCODE?

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No, just invoked the programmer clicking on "autodetect device on the jtag chain", which is working with my MAX-II chip, but it is not working with flex10k. Tomorrow i will invoke the jtag debugger on the quartus v9, too.

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How have you wired your USB-Blaster into the FLEX10K board? You comment that the board has a byte-blaster circuit built into it. Did you connect your USB-Blaster to the inputs to this byte-blaster circuit, or did you remove it, and attach the USB-Blaster directly to the FPGA JTAG pins?

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Well, that is a very good question, but the i have a right reply: the board is made with a 74xx244 chip puted on a dip socket, and it also has got an LPT connector which should be plugged into a PC parallel port, but the board has a JTAG connector which should pin to pin compatble with the usb-blaster cable.

I say "it should" because i have no schematic or pinout, and i have only checked that the two gnd signals of the jtag connector are matching with the ones on the jtag cable, and they do!

I don't know where TDI/TDO/TMS etc are routed to the fpga chip, i only trust they are right as the fact the connector is labeled "jtag".

my usb blaster cable has the Vcc removed, so it does not power the pcb, the powersupply is applied from an external 5V 2A DC device.

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The USB-Blaster power for its internal buffer comes from the target, so you need to make sure you have that connected.

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The USB is powering the usb blaster, the flex10k jtag connector has no Vcc connected to the jtag cable, to be honest the usb blaster jtag cable has the Vcc wire removed, anyway the MAX-II board is working with success this way.

but i really want to put my 84plcc flex10K chip into a plcc socket soldered on a 1000 holes proto board, any schematic around in order to do that ?

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the board is made with a 74xx244 chip puted on a dip socket, and it also has got an LPT connector which should be plugged into a PC parallel port, but the board has a JTAG connector which should pin to pin compatble with the usb-blaster cable.

I say "it should" because i have no schematic or pinout, and i have only checked that the two gnd signals of the jtag connector are matching with the ones on the jtag cable, and they do!

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Boards that have two programming options quite often have a jumper or DIP switch to select what is in control of the JTAG interface. You should toggle a signal on the TCK line with TMS held high, and probe the FPGA to see if you can see the TCK waveform. The JTAG debugger tool will allow you to generate toggling signals.

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I don't know where TDI/TDO/TMS etc are routed to the fpga chip, i only trust they are right as the fact the connector is labeled "jtag".

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Their pin assignments are fixed. Just probe the pins on the device.

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my usb blaster cable has the Vcc removed, so it does not power the pcb, the powersupply is applied from an external 5V 2A DC device.

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The VCC on the 10-pin JTAG header does not power the board, it is there to power the buffer located inside the JTAG cable. That buffer implements logic level translation between the 3.3V CPLD and the JTAG buffers on whatever board you are using.

If you do not have that pin connected to the USB-Blaster, then the TCK/TMS/TDI signals will never toggle.

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anyway the MAX-II board is working with success this way.

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Then you have something wrong with your USB-Blaster. Is it an Altera or Terasic USB-Blaster, or is it a clone?

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but i really want to put my 84plcc flex10K chip into a plcc socket soldered on a 1000 holes proto board, any schematic around in order to do that ?

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Just draw one.

Why are you even thinking about using a FLEX10K device. They're old and useless. Buy a Cyclone device for $15 and you have access to SignalTap II logic analyzer, JTAG to the FPGA fabric, on-chip PLLs, LVDS I/Os, etc.

The FLEX devices are old and dead, its time for you to move on to a more modern device.

Cheers,

Dave

Hi,

i have tested the flex10k device with the jtag debugger and it says there is uncertain device on the jtag chain with error on clock ... it sound very bad, because when i plug the maxII chip it says "EPM1270 detected" with a lot of info about.

i have no option switch in order to select the on board byteblaster or the jtag on which to plug the usbblaster. No dip switch, no jumper, nothing.

I am using flex10k because I have a tube of 50 flex10k chips, bought for cheap ($10 for the whole) and they are good as the fact they are ram-configurable device (it has a ram inside which stores the bitstream config), my maxII is flash configurable device (it has a flash inside which stores the bitstrea), i prefer the ram method =P

is there any other cpld or fpga with ram config instead of flash config ?

about cyclone i will buy the DE0-nano board soon, but about toying i really like flex10k, which is plcc84 package and should works very well @5V

thank you to have explained me the jtag sensing pin, which is called Power but the real meaning is understanding if the target is 3.3V or 5V: my usb blaster cable should be an original altera one, but i got it form china so i don'r really know, anycase i also got a kit from altera which include an original usbblaster and i will use it.

Ok, today i will reverse enge the flex10k in order to understand how the chip is wired to the jtag connector and to the clock generator.

I am using this board in order to understand how to build my own flex10k board, have you got any suggestion / schematic example or other to get me started ?

regards

f.e. about IEEE Std. 1149.1 Signals (jtag)

Altera recommends pulling the TCK signal low through the internal weak pull-down resistor or an external 1-k resistor, any other suggestion ?

Here are some FLEX10K based designs:

http://www.ovro.caltech.edu/~dwh/correlator/pdf/digbase_sch_rev_c1.pdf

http://www.ovro.caltech.edu/~dwh/correlator/pdf/digbase_spec_rev_c1.pdf

http://www.ovro.caltech.edu/~dwh/correlator/pdf/correlator_sch_rev_c1.pdf

http://www.ovro.caltech.edu/~dwh/correlator/pdf/correlator_spec_rev_c1.pdf

here's photos of them

http://www.ovro.caltech.edu/~dwh/correlator/

Cheers,

Dave

thank you, it's a very interesting project

finally i have understood the reason why my usb-jtag-cable is not working with my flex10K board: the problem is related to the jtag chain in where the jtag connector has been wired as "the last device in the chain", and this is terribly wrong !!!

The byteblaster is the first device in the chain and his-244-chip is propagating signals through the jtag wires to the fpga chip, to the eeprom configuration chip (it's an optional, not soldered on my devboard but you can add it), and finally to the jtag connector on where you could plug a cable to connect other jtag device on the jtag chain.

It has no sense for me! A jtag connector to add external device ? what is the meaning of that ?

No sense, but it makes terribly wrong the wiring i did putting the jtag connector of my usb-jtag-cable on it because TDO and TDI can't be propagated in right way.

I really think the final solution is: i have to make a new dev-board putting a PLCC84 socket on a 1000-holes-pcb, putting a flex10k inside it, adding a 50Mhz 4-pin oscillator clock on the clk43 pin of the fpga, and wire the fpga jtag (TDI, TDO, TMS, TCK) signals the the usb-jtag-connector, then installing Quartus-II V8 and have fun with it.

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finally i have understood the reason why my usb-jtag-cable is not working with my flex10K board: the problem is related to the jtag chain in where the jtag connector has been wired as "the last device in the chain", and this is terribly wrong !!!

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I think the Altera UP1/UP2/UP3 boards have a connection like this, so you can daisy chain boards. However, they have two JTAG connectors, one for the USB-Blaster (or ByteBlaster at the time they were created) and then another for the daisy chain. Does your board have two JTAG connectors?

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The byteblaster is the first device in the chain and his-244-chip is propagating signals through the jtag wires to the fpga chip, to the eeprom configuration chip (it's an optional, not soldered on my devboard but you can add it), and finally to the jtag connector on where you could plug a cable to connect other jtag device on the jtag chain.

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Ah, I see, so rather than having two 10-pin JTAG connectors on this board, they have the ByteBlaster built in. In that case, just build an adapter board to wire the signals from your USB-Blaster into the parallel port pins.

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It has no sense for me! A jtag connector to add external device ? what is the meaning of that ?

No sense, but it makes terribly wrong the wiring i did putting the jtag connector of my usb-jtag-cable on it because TDO and TDI can't be propagated in right way.

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Right, and the TCK and TMS signals would also be the wrong way.

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I really think the final solution is: i have to make a new dev-board putting a PLCC84 socket on a 1000-holes-pcb, putting a flex10k inside it, adding a 50Mhz 4-pin oscillator clock on the clk43 pin of the fpga, and wire the fpga jtag (TDI, TDO, TMS, TCK) signals the the usb-jtag-connector, then installing Quartus-II V8 and have fun with it.

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I'd create a USB-Blaster to ByteBlaster cable adapter. It won't take very long. Get a DB25 connector and a 10-pin header, and wire them up.

Cheers,

Dave

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I think the Altera UP1/UP2/UP3 boards have a connection like this, so you can daisy chain boards. However, they have two JTAG connectors, one for the USB-Blaster (or ByteBlaster at the time they were created) and then another for the daisy chain. Does your board have two JTAG connectors?

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Unfortunately no, the byteblaster is onboard and the jtag connector is for the last device on the jtag chain, it is not for the usbblaster cable, i mean if you plug the usb-jtag-cable there you will be wrong in the jtag chain

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I'd create a USB-Blaster to ByteBlaster cable adapter. It won't take very long. Get a DB25 connector and a 10-pin header, and wire them up.

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the problem is: i am on x86 laptop which has no lpt port, modern laptops and desktops do no have lpt port, too.

An other problem is all usb-to-parallel port adapter are not working, so the only solution is to use the usb-jtag.

this is the connection scheme i got reversing the board

                       parallel port
        /----------------------------------------
        |                byteblaster             |
        \----------------------------------------/
             |           |            |     |       
        /----------------------------------------
        |                  jtag                  |
        \----------------------------------------/
            tdi         tdo           tms  tck  
             |           |             |    |
             |           |             |    |
             |           |             |    |
             |           | tdi         |    |
             |    /---------------\    |    |
             |    |     eeprom    |----+    |
             |    |    epc2lc20   |---------+
             |    \---------------/    |    |
             |           | tdo         |    |
             |           |             |    |
             |           | tdi         |    |
             |    /---------------\    |    |
             |    |    flex10k    |----+    |
             |    | epf10k10lc84  |---------+
             |    \---------------/    |    |
             |           | tdo         |    |
             |           |             |    |
             |           | tdi         |    |
             |    /---------------\    |    |
             |    | j2 connector  |----+    |
             |    | to other      |---------+
             |    | jtag chain    |    |    |
             |    \---------------/    |    |
             |           | tdo         |    |
             |           |             |    |
             +-----------+

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the problem is: i am on x86 laptop which has no lpt port, modern laptops and desktops do no have lpt port, too.

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What I am suggesting is:

1) Plug you USB-Blaster into your laptop.

2) Connect the 10-pin header on your USB-Blaster to the appropriate JTAG pins on the ByteBlaster DB25 connector. The signals you need to connect are TCK, TMS, TDI, TDO, GND, and VCC to power the buffer in the JTAG cable.

Then you can use the USB-Blaster to control the board.

Cheers,

Dave