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Altera_Forum's avatar
Altera_Forum
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20 years ago

Flash Programmer Problems

Hi Everyone,

I have built a target board in SOPC builder in order to program the flash memory on my board. The target board contains an EPCS controller and CFI flash controller (the actual board does not actually have a CFI flash device, it only has an EPCS device. I'm following the advice given on Altera's Nios II errata webpage).

The error I'm getting is the same as ppl in previous posts have got, ie, 'Unable to synchronize with target' after downloading the target board SOF onto the FPGA.

I have a reset delay block in the design. I'm pretty sure this works because I've tried it on another Nios II system and it works fine in that I am able to download and execute code on the processor.

The clock to the system to is 100 MHz. I have also replaced the firmware_ROM.hex file as suggested in the Altera website. I have no hardware image setting for the EPCS device as of now.

Has anyone out there encountered a similar problem? Is there something I'm missing? Is there a way to debug this and figure out what's going wrong where?

Thanks a lot.

2 Replies

  • Altera_Forum's avatar
    Altera_Forum
    Icon for Honored Contributor rankHonored Contributor
    20 years ago

    Have you tested that you can access your EPCS device from a regular SOPC Builder design (not a target board design...)?

    - Using the memtest software template is a good way to do this.

    - slacker
  • Altera_Forum's avatar
    Altera_Forum
    Icon for Honored Contributor rankHonored Contributor
    20 years ago

    Hi,

    I tried the memtest firmware using /dev/epcs_controller as the device and the EPCS passed all the tests.

    I'm still wondering on what the problem would be? Is there a way to program firmware into flash without using the target board method. Is it possible to generate a file which you could download to the flash directly?

    Thanks a lot.

    -Sid