Intermittent DE10-Standard error starting GDB server with quartus_hps

Hello,

We have 15 DE10-Standard boards being used with Quartus 18.1 and the associated version of Altera Monitor Program on Ubuntu 24.04 (amd64).

Generally the boards work without issue, however in the Monitor Program we occasionally see 'Download System - Partial Success: The system has successfully downloaded onto the board, but HPS components could not be configured.' Power cycling the board doesn't seem to resolve the error, nor does swapping the board to a different desktop. After a number of tries the error will go away. We haven't been able to isolate an exact pattern but issue doesn't appear random either, it will keep showing up for certain boards, and then go away, then show up on other boards.

Another symptom we see is that when a board downloads the systems successfully, during the final step of the process the JTAG TX LED on the board appears to turn solid green. On the boards that hang and fail, the same LED flashes rapidly while the process hangs.

The monitor program logs show the following commands are run before the error appears:

$ /home/$USER/DE10/monitorprogramtutorial/
$ make clean
# The board name in quotes below is variable and appears to be unique to each board or connection
$ /opt/intelFPGA_lite/18.1/quartus/bin64/quartus_pgm -c "DE-SoC [1-10]" --auto
$ quartus_pgm -c "DE-SoC [1-10]" -m jtag -o "P;/opt/intelFPGA_lite/18.1/University_Program/Computer_Systems/DE10-Standard/DE10-Standard_Computer/verilog/DE10_Standard_Computer.sof@2"
$ quartus_hps --cable="DE-SoC [1-10]" -o GDBSERVER --gdbport0=3212 --preloader=/opt/intelFPGA_lite/18.1/University_Program/Monitor_Program/arm_tools/u-boot-spl.de10-standard.srec --preloaderaddr=0xffff14f0

Running these commands manually results in the final command either:

1. Starting a GDB server very quickly:

>>Resetting HPS.
>>Downloading preloader.......
>>Program loaded. PC set to program entry (0xFFFF0000)
>>Setting vector base address register to: 0xffff0000
>>Running preloader..
>>Preloader successfully run.
Starting GDB Server.
Listening on port 3212 for connection from GDB

2. Hanging for a long time when 'Downloading preloader.......' and then failing at the 'Running preloader...................' stage and hanging indefinitely. Ending the process with Ctrl+C shows:

Error: Encounter JTAG AJI error while accessing HPS
Error: send_access_data() error while accessing DP Register
Error: Fail to select Access Port
Error: Fail to access Bank 0x0 of Port 1
Error: Fail to READ ACCESS to the Physical Reg
Error: AJI failed to send data
Error: Encounter JTAG AJI error while accessing HPS
Error: send_access_data() error while accessing DP Register
Error: Fail to select Access Port
Error: Fail to access Bank 0x0 of Port 1
Error: Fail to READ ACCESS to the Physical Reg
Error: Fail to enable DEBUG feature
Error: AJI failed to send data
Error: Encounter JTAG AJI error while accessing HPS
Error: send_access_data() error while accessing DP Register
Error: Fail to select Access Port
Error: Fail to access Bank 0x0 of Port 1
Error: Fail to READ ACCESS to the Physical Reg
Error: Failed to load program.
Error: AJI failed to send data
Error: Encounter JTAG AJI error while accessing HPS
Error: send_access_data() error while accessing DP Register
Error: Encounter JTAG AJI error while reading Control/Status Register
Error: AJI failed to send data
Error: Encounter JTAG AJI error while accessing HPS
Error: send_access_data() error while accessing DP Register
Error: Fail to select Access Port
Error: Fail to access Bank 0x0 of Port 0
Error: Fail to READ ACCESS to the Physical Reg
Error: Fail to write to MPU Module Reset Register
Error: Engine failed to set down the hardware
Error: Quartus Prime Programmer was unsuccessful. 0 errors, 0 warnings
    Error: Peak virtual memory: 187 megabytes
    Error: Processing ended: Tue Aug 11 11:44:38 2026
    Error: Elapsed time: 00:05:05
    Error: Total CPU time (on all processors): 00:00:01

Any thoughts or suggestions are greatly appreciated.