Use an internal clock source ???

Hi again,

I find it amusing that i've moved all my descrete chips into an Altera (Max7000) device, and yet i still need to clock it externally on the master clock pin, sourced from a lazy 555 or a 4040 cmos counter etc etc....ultimately i'd like a single Altera device on my PCB with no extra chips required.

I wondered if there's a sneaky way to simply create a hex-invertor oscillator within the Altera device itself, with an external Xtal or R/C timing ????? anyone? anyone?

Someone mentioned to me that i shouldn't try to attempt that with the main clock input pin, but *maybe* any of the 'spare' i/o pins could possibly do this for me?

Maybe the output of the hex-oscillator would then feed into the master clock pin?

My application is NOT frequency or time critical...it's simply driving a bunch of large counters for eprom addressing or flashing lights (disco) etc....

So, accuracy isn't really that much of a great concern for me....

no, i'm not trying to pll-phaselock anything down to the 14th decimal place ;-)

Thanx in advance,

Marty.