I recently got a notification from a distributor that the USB Blaster (PL-USB-BLASTER-RCN) is being discontinued. I haven't been able to find any documentation on Altera's site to confirm this, but I am most likely not looking in the correct location. Can anyone else confirm this? Are there any replacements/substitutes planned? Thanks!

I guess that Altera might bring out an "USB Blaster II" with USB HS interface in the next years, but there aren't any official statements. The note about USB Blaster Rev. C being the replacement for previous types has been recently updated at altera.com. Even if discontinued at Altera, various clones and the official second source (from Terasic) will me most likely available for many years.

The use of the FT2232 and CPLD to emulate onboard USB blaster seems to be common on many of the newer development boards, and I wondering if discontinuing the USB blaster is a reflection of this. It is easier and more compact to just use a standard USB cable to program your FPGA. ~James --- Quote Start --- I guess that Altera might bring out an "USB Blaster II" with USB HS interface in the next years, but there aren't any official statements. The note about USB Blaster Rev. C being the replacement for previous types has been recently updated at altera.com. Even if discontinued at Altera, various clones and the official second source (from Terasic) will me most likely available for many years. --- Quote End ---

Hi James, --- Quote Start --- The use of the FT2232 and CPLD to emulate onboard USB blaster seems to be common on many of the newer development boards, and I wondering if discontinuing the USB blaster is a reflection of this. It is easier and more compact to just use a standard USB cable to program your FPGA. ~James --- Quote End --- Which boards have you seen that use the FT2232? I've only ever seen the BeMicro use it. The "Arrow USB-Blaster" is significantly slower than a standard USB-Blaster when working with SignalTap II. I have a BeMicro and BeMicro-SDK interfaced to external FTDI UM245R and UM232H modules, and SignalTap II capture using the BeMicro is way slower than using the BeMicro-SDK. The FT2232C MPSSE mode can be operated at the same frequency as the bit-mode/byte-modes on the standard USB-Blaster, so I'm not sure what causes the speed difference ... probably software/driver support. I've seen that some of the newer development kits now come with a USB-Blaster II = Cypress EZ-USB FX2 + MAX II. This implements a USB-Blaster plus a higher-speed comms channel to the on-board FPGA. Cheers, Dave

Dave, I am not exactly sure which device is being used (FT2232 or FT232R for example) but many of the Terasic boards are FTDI controller + Max II CPLD for the on board USB blaster. Interestingly enough, the schematics for the DE-Nano, for example, do not show the circuit in schematic detail. Only a higher level block diagram is shown. From what I have looked at on the Terasic dev boards, this is generally true, as well as the recent and new Altera dev boards. The frustrating part to me is the lack of transparency with a proven solution for this approach. I know, there have been several discussions of writing drivers, etc. on the forum, but the fact that this is not an "easy" process is a bit disappointing. So if Altera is going to discontinue the USB blaster, then as the pendulum swings this way, I would like to see more transparency on this driver and on board JTAG hardware. The closest thing that I've seen to a really nice driver is something written in Python, which will program the Altera FPGA through JTAG, obtained at: https://github.com/progranism/ft232r-jtag Maybe a group project to take the code and wrap a PyQt/PySide gui around the code that I just referenced with the previous link? Thanks, James --- Quote Start --- Hi James, Which boards have you seen that use the FT2232? I've only ever seen the BeMicro use it. The "Arrow USB-Blaster" is significantly slower than a standard USB-Blaster when working with SignalTap II. I have a BeMicro and BeMicro-SDK interfaced to external FTDI UM245R and UM232H modules, and SignalTap II capture using the BeMicro is way slower than using the BeMicro-SDK. The FT2232C MPSSE mode can be operated at the same frequency as the bit-mode/byte-modes on the standard USB-Blaster, so I'm not sure what causes the speed difference ... probably software/driver support. I've seen that some of the newer development kits now come with a USB-Blaster II = Cypress EZ-USB FX2 + MAX II. This implements a USB-Blaster plus a higher-speed comms channel to the on-board FPGA. Cheers, Dave --- Quote End ---

Hi James, --- Quote Start --- I am not exactly sure which device is being used (FT2232 or FT232R for example) but many of the Terasic boards are FTDI controller + Max II CPLD for the on board USB blaster. --- Quote End --- The on-board USB-Blasters are FT245B+MAX II. The BeMicro-SDK uses an FT245R (which has an internal EEPROM). --- Quote Start --- Interestingly enough, the schematics for the DE-Nano, for example, do not show the circuit in schematic detail. Only a higher level block diagram is shown. From what I have looked at on the Terasic dev boards, this is generally true, as well as the recent and new Altera dev boards. --- Quote End --- The schematic is not really that exciting. Its just the FT245R in asynchronous FIFO mode connected to the MAX II :) I've uploaded the BeMicro-SDK schematic, it shows the USB-Blaster circuit. Not very enlightening is it? What is more important is the USB-Blaster protocol. That was reverse-engineered and published a while ago by Kawk http://sourceforge.net/apps/mediawiki/urjtag/index.php?title=cable_altera_usb-blaster --- Quote Start --- The frustrating part to me is the lack of transparency with a proven solution for this approach. --- Quote End --- Yes, it bugs me too. I'm working on a clone ... when it works, I'll write up a tutorial. The latest FTDI direct access driver allow you to access a USB-Blaster ... I'll also write that up shortly. Cheers, Dave

USB Blaster obselete? | Altera Community

21 Replies

Altera_Forum
Honored Contributor
13 years ago
I will take a look at these schematics, but I think the concern or issue is being able to develop your own board. This requires having working CPLD firmware and PC side software. Will these kits supply this? In the past this has never been the case. Best, James

--- Quote Start ---
I've checked with the people who would know and can say authoritatively that USB Blaster is not being obsoleted. If it was then there would be a product discontinuation notice on the Altera website.

There is no supported interface to jtag_client.dll, but if you talk to your FAE you may be able to get documentation about it.

Also, you might want to take a look at the schematics for the Stratix/Arria/Cyclone V boards, (eg http://www.altera.com/products/devkits/altera/kit-cyclone-v-gx.html) - these have an On-Board USB-Blaster II which runs JTAG at 24Mhz and provides a ~220Mb/s dedicated debug interface for SystemConsole to talk to the FPGA.
--- Quote End ---

Forum Discussion

USB Blaster obselete?

21 Replies

Recent Discussions

USB-BlasterII mounts as "USB-Blaster variant"

Quartus Dark Theme on Linux - Solution

Error(23098) when using IPM_IOPLL on Agliex 7

Quartus 13.1 License

Highlight similar instances of a selected word fails when scrolling