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Dominique_'s avatar
Dominique_
Icon for New Contributor rankNew Contributor
5 years ago

EPM7064LC programming on my own

Hello, I'm a hobbyist in electronics. I own a few EMP7064LC84-15 CPLD Chip (Altera MAX 7000 series) which do not have ISP feature (no JTAG programming). I found general purpose "inexpensive" chip pr...
  • Dominique_'s avatar
    Dominique_
    Icon for New Contributor rankNew Contributor
    5 years ago

    Hello,

    sorry, I wasn't clear enough. I have read nearly all the documentation about MAX7000 including the link you provided. Actually in this document just after the "ISP programming" section (page 16), you can find the "Programming with external hardware" (page 21).

    I've already programmed MAX7000S with the ISP feature through JTAG (with a self made byte blaster cable) successfully, but the three chips I have don't have ISP feature (EPM7064LC). The "external hardware" this document is talking about would certainly do the job but it (or any other from other manufacturers) is too expensive, and I would like to design the circuitry by myself, just to program the EMP7064, assuming I have all the programming data in a .pof file (generated by Quartus II software). As far as I could see, nothing in this document nor in any related document (ex : "Altera Programming Hardware Data Sheet") gives the slightest clue about how to do this.

    So, given some programming digital data, I would like to know what voltage to apply on what EMP7064 pin upon what timing to actually program my EPM7064LC chip, avoiding the cost of those expensive "external hardware".

    I found a web link (http://elm-chan.org/works/avrx/report_e.html) talking about the information I'm looking for, which is called "parallel programming mode". But it concerns AVR (Atmel) not Altera chips.

    Thanks Dominique

    • ak6dn's avatar
      ak6dn
      Icon for Regular Contributor rankRegular Contributor
      5 years ago

      Programming information on the EPM7000 series for the non-JTAG devices was not made public, only available via NDA back in the old days to test equipment manufacturers.

      Unless you literally have hundreds of EPM7064 devices you want to program going down that path will not be worthwhile. You can buy a modern device programmer like the EEtools TopMaxII/III with the appropriate adapter (ie, PLCC I'm assuming) but it will set you back close to US$1000 in total.

      I would recommend scrapping the older parallel devices, and pursue the JTAG ISP approach as you have done.

      And by the way, Microchip/Atmel still has their ATF15xxASV series parts in production that are functional replacements for the EPM7xxxS series (32,64,96,128). And they have their POF2JED tool that allows you to take an existing Altera .POF file and convert it to .JED to program their devices via JTAG.

      Just my 2c.