EPCS booting problem

When you try to program it a second time, does it verify the contents to be the same?

Jake

Hi,

I had similar with my card - recompiling the same project under v9.1 generated a pof which programms but the CycloneII did not start. Pof of unchanged project compiled with v9.0 operated. I deactivated the "generate compressed bitstream" option and this pof worked...

Perhaps you could try same on your system?

CU, CS

Same problem here, epcs flash programming with 9.0 produces a bootable board, but with 9.1 the board won't boot.

Turning off "generate compressed bitstream" option didn't work for me. I'm using Cyclone II.

The SOF file itseld seems to be working fine, since programming it directly to FPGA makes it operating correctly.

I've noticed that using sof2flash routine from 9.1 produces different flash-file than sof2flash from 9.0 using the same SOF file as input for both.

The difference is within the first 64 bytes of the .flash file, so that's probably the cause of non-bootable EPCS.

I've reported this to Altera but haven't got a solution or confirm about this bug yet.

Regards,

Jari

Hey,

Same problem here since I installed Quartus 9.1. My Cyclone II did not enter user mode. Deactivating the compression seemingly solved the problem.

Same issue noticed for me, too. I must use compression because of limited space in EPCS.

NStatus is low after finish configuration although CONF_DONE is high. This happens to Cyclone EP1C12 and EP1C6 devices.

Expect a quick fix from Altera.

Got a reply from Altera:

"A fix has already been made and so it should be included in the next release"

So if this fix is not made public soon, I guess it's included in the SP1 sometime in January/February timeframe?

In the meantime I guess we must just stay away from 9.1 and continue using 9.0 ...

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Same issue noticed for me, too. I must use compression because of limited space in EPCS.

NStatus is low after finish configuration although CONF_DONE is high. This happens to Cyclone EP1C12 and EP1C6 devices.

Expect a quick fix from Altera.

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Hi,

while I did not need to use compression in my system, I decided to go with 9.1 and not to generate compressed bitstreams as I did with 9.0. Nevertheless I was in touch with ALTERA and got a hint to use the "Convert Programming Files" option (located in "File") to generate the POF. You have to "Disable AS/AP mode CONF_DONE pin error check" in "Advanced" (you have to add file (SOF) first and to check Compression under Properties) to ogenerate a compressed POF. This worked for me, resulting in a compressed POF with FPGA configuring of.

But this adds work to get the POF which might not be worth to be able to use the 9.1....

Sincerely, CS

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How to fix it if I need to use Flash Programmer in NIOS II IDE to program the EPCS? The NIOS II processor is booting from EPCS.

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There's no fix that I'm aware of.

Either you just wait until Altera fixes this or you switch back to 9.0 version.