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Altera_Forum's avatar
Altera_Forum
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13 years ago

monitoring all the pins

I'm working in a project that has been working before, there is one fpga emitting data and the other receiving, the transmitter I know that is working but the receiver is not working.

Before the receiver I have a board that that has to make some conversions, it should be connected to the receiver in some pins that I already know but, with signaltap I can't see anything. I'm thinking that this board is not working but it could be that this connector is linking to other pins, for this reason I would like to know if it's possible to monitor all the pins (without much effort), in the program that I already have, there are assigned only some pins and this are the pins that I'm monitoring but I would like to monitor even the unassigned, it doesn't matter if the program is only monitoring I only want to check haw is this connected

7 Replies

  • Altera_Forum's avatar
    Altera_Forum
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    13 years ago

    I can't say I know of an easy way to monitor all of the pins on your FPGA. Adding them in Signaltap is about the only way I can think of. Just as a side note, be sure to check your trigger conditions in signaltap to make sure you aren't fooling yourself (such as a pair of conditions that can never happen at the same time).

    I wish you the best of luck finding your problem.
  • Altera_Forum's avatar
    Altera_Forum
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    13 years ago

    Thank you for your reply, I'm new in this field and I'm pretty lost. When I set the trigger for this pins I use don't care for all the pins because I don't know what should happen exactly there, I'm not sure if the trigger will work with this. Do you think that this is correct??

  • Altera_Forum's avatar
    Altera_Forum
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    13 years ago

    If you set all of the triggers to dont care you can either download a one off scan of the signals connected in signaltap, or continuous read. Setting a trigger condition will mean you download the pin states and diagrams only when those trigger conditions occur.

    Usually you just look at the part of the logic you're currently working on rather than all of the pins. Signaltap allows you to connect to internal logic as well as external pins.
  • Altera_Forum's avatar
    Altera_Forum
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    13 years ago

    I on't undestand very well, then, how can I monitor all the pins if I don't know the reponse of thiese? Should I use trigger? thanks!

  • Altera_Forum's avatar
    Altera_Forum
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    13 years ago

    you can set a trigger on anything, but it would only make sense if you knew what you were looking for.