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Altera_Forum's avatar
Altera_Forum
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10 years ago

DE1 SoC Troubleshoot

Hello, I am a second year Electrical engineering student. For my microcomputers class I have purchased a DE1 Soc from Terasic.

One normal evening I was happily coding away Verilog for one of the labs, had my DE1 plugged in to my pc via USB. Suddenly I heard that beeping sound that Windows makes when a usb device is plugged in, except the sound beeped like 5 times in a very short period.

I checked my board, restarted it and now the default program that cycles through numbers on HEX displays doesn't work anymore. Some HEX displays don't even light up and the board gets VERY hot in a very short period of time. I tried uploading some basic Verilog programs on it just to test if it works or not, it doesn't.

One of the TAs in my class suggested that flash memory is corrupted. I have searched the web but haven't found anything on how to go about fixing it, or of it's even fixable. Would appreciate any input.

Instead of executing the default program, hex display is just stuck on displaying of what's supposed to be all HEX's lighted up, except some of them aren't even working anymore. I have attached a photo. Also here is a link to the same photo: http://i.imgur.com/eeil4kt.jpg?1

Thank you

6 Replies

  • Altera_Forum's avatar
    Altera_Forum
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    10 years ago

    Do you have a USB blaster that you can connect to the JTAG port and see if you can communicate with the Altera chips?

    Although if the board gets hot it's not a good sign I'm afraid.
  • Altera_Forum's avatar
    Altera_Forum
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    10 years ago

    Thank you for your reply!

    I do have the cable.

    I should probably add that the port that might have caused problems on my PC operates fine, my mice is plugged in to the same port and operates as usual. MSEL configuration is set factory default and always have been.

    I also attached another photo, showing exactly which part of the board gets hot.

    Terasic people told me all they could do was send me replacement HEX LEDs ..? I doubt that would be of any use.

    I'm not that proficient at operating the board. All that I've used it for is to run some Verilog code and later in the semester, use it as a machine to run assembley code.
  • Altera_Forum's avatar
    Altera_Forum
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    10 years ago

    DE1-SoC produce a lot of heat, this can be normal. I added an heatsink to mine. Have you tried replacing SD card, cable and computer?

  • Altera_Forum's avatar
    Altera_Forum
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    10 years ago

    Yes this heat can be normal.

    When you plug it back in your PC's usb port, is it detected correctly? Can you upload designs with the Quartus programmer and does it report success?
  • Altera_Forum's avatar
    Altera_Forum
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    10 years ago

    --- Quote Start ---

    Yes this heat can be normal.

    When you plug it back in your PC's usb port, is it detected correctly? Can you upload designs with the Quartus programmer and does it report success?

    --- Quote End ---

    Yes it is detected. I see the board in the device manager. I am also able to upload basic designs on the board through Quartus, however the board doesn't execute any of them.

    --- Quote Start ---

    DE1-SoC produce a lot of heat, this can be normal. I added an heatsink to mine. Have you tried replacing SD card, cable and computer?

    --- Quote End ---

    Alright that seems fair. I do have access to one of my classmates' boards and it doesn't get nearly as hot as mine. My board gets quite hot in the period of 10 seconds after power up, by quite hot I mean it is quite hot, not warm. I am not sure if that is normal.

    I haven't tried replacing SD card, since I never used any.

    Also tried uploading designs from a different PC and cable, same result. Designs upload to the board successfully via Quartus Programmer, fail to execute on the board itself.

    Thank you for your replies!
  • Altera_Forum's avatar
    Altera_Forum
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    10 years ago

    1) Check if clock and PLL are working right.. Try changing clock with another onboard and don't use PLL