What is the initial state of a state machine on power up?

Description

When synthesizing a state machine for Altera^® devices, you must make sure the state machine is reset properly. All registers in an Altera device will power up in a low state, unless Not-Gate-Push-Back is used or the power-up high options are set on the register. All Altera devices support Not-Gate-Push-Back.

If the state machine is defined so that one or more of the state bits are non-zero in the reset state, then you should explicitly reset the state machine using a reset signal (see below). If the state machine is not explicitly reset in this case, the state machine could power up into an undefined state, and MAX PLUS^® II will give the following message:

Info: State machine '<name>' must be reset to guarantee proper operation

To correct this problem, the state machine should be explicitly reset. Examples for AHDL, VHDL, and Verilog HDL design entry formats are shown below.

For AHDL, the reset signal should be declared and asserted.

SUBDESIGN statemachine

(

   clk, reset, ena, d : INPUT;

   q                  : OUTPUT;

)



VARIABLE

   ss: MACHINE WITH STATES (s0=1, s1=0); -- reset state is s0, state register is non-zero



BEGIN



   ss.reset = reset; -- assert this signal to properly reset the state machine

<...>

For VHDL, the initial state may be defined by an IF statement and a reset signal.

ENTITY statemachine IS

PORT(  clk  : IN STD_LOGIC;

input  : IN STD_LOGIC;

reset  : IN STD_LOGIC;

output  : OUT STD_LOGIC);

END statemachine;



ARCHITECTURE a OF statemachine IS

    TYPE STATE_TYPE IS (s1, s2); -- reset state is s1

    ATTRIBUTE ENUM_ENCODING : STRING;

    ATTRIBUTE ENUM_ENCODING OF STATE_TYPE : TYPE IS "1 0"; -- state register for s1 is non-zero

    SIGNAL state : STATE_TYPE;

BEGIN

   PROCESS (clk)

       BEGIN

          IF reset = '1' THEN state <= s2; -- causes state machine to power up in state s2

             IF (clk'EVENT AND clk = '1') THEN

                  CASE state IS

<...>

For Verilog HDL, the initial state must be defined by an IF statement and a reset signal, i.e.

module statemachine (clk, in, reset, out);

   input   clk, in, reset;

   output  out;          

   reg     out;

   reg     state;

            

   parameter s1 = 1, s2 = 0;

   always @ (state) begin

      case (state) -- define outputs

         s1: out = 0;

<..>

   always @ (posedge clk or posedge reset) begin

      if (reset) state = s1; -- causes state machine to power up in state s1

      else case (state) -- define state transitions

            s1: if (in) state = s2;

<...>

For all HDL formats, if you do not define the state machine's initial state to be all zeros, explicitly reset the state machine, since the state machine will power up low.

See the AHDL, VHDL, and Verilog HDL sections of MAX PLUS II Help for complete information on implementing state machines in MAX PLUS II.