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Altera_Forum
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15 years ago

Do I need external SRAM?

Dear experts, I am considering using EP3C25 (Cyclone III) devices with Active Serial Configuration device (64Mbit EPCS64) with or without external SRAM. My program file will be stored in E...
Altera_Forum's avatar
Altera_Forum
Icon for Honored Contributor rankHonored Contributor
15 years ago

SRAM is not required for booting any fpga device. Upon boot configuration data is transferred from epcs (or any other configuration device based on NV memory) in dedicated sram cells which store configuration in a volatile way; this sram is dedicated for configuration and is not available to user design.

Everything else depends on what you are using the fpga for. If you configure a Nios processor you usually need external memory for storing instructions and data, but this is not strictly necessary.