funny extra characters on Nios II console

Guys

Im fairly new to Altera and nios, but am working through a basic spi program. It seems that i get some funny characters every once in a while at startup and then the code doesnt work.

I get something like:

| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |

Welcome to Nios II

or @@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@

Welcome to Nios II

It seems like this might occur if a memory IORD/IOWR issue is occurring.

I say that because all of the sudden my IOWR_8DIRECT calls dont seem to be executing. They were working fine before and nothing obvious has changed during their calls.

In addition, I get something about "trying to access invalid memory" when i use certain addresses in my system console write_from_file command.

The address does seem to be valid for my onchip memory.

Im sure that somehow this is all linked together. Any ideas?

Also, is there a way to sort of flush out/release all memory being used? I tried power cycling my eval board, but the problem persists.

thank you guys!!