MAX 10 Internal Clock and Flash Lock

I take offence :) that you consider the internal oscillator 'useless'.

I have several designs - very simple hardware designs - that run from the internal oscillator and nothing else. The hardware designs are simple and cheaper than they might otherwise be thanks to the internal oscillator.

'Horses for courses' some might say. If you need something accurate you just have to add a little more cost to your board.

As for the FLASH protection - MAX 10 supports AES encryption to protect your design from 'pirates' - ooo aarrrh. Have a read of the AES Encryption Protection section on page 2-13 of the max 10 fpga configuration user guide (https://www.altera.com/literature/hb/max-10/ug_m10_config.pdf).

Cheers,

Alex