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Pin Assignments on the Nios II Eval Board

Altera_Forum
Honored Contributor II
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Hi, 

 

I ordered a Nios II Eval Kit from Altera recently, it looks like this: 

http://www.altera.com/products/devkits/images/n2eval_cyc_sml.jpg  

http://www.altera.com/products/devkits/alt..._eval_1c12.html (http://www.altera.com/products/devkits/altera/kit-nios_eval_1c12.html

I am wanting to drive an LCD using 11 of the user definable pins set to output mode. I've made a project, I have a built a system in the SOPC builder based off of an Altera tutorial that has a Nios II soft processor code, JTAG UART, a PIO core, and few other objects. In Quartus II I've got my SOPC system on a block diagram with input and ouput pins attached. My problem is related to the pin assignment. I can see where I can assign pints to PIN_G3, or PIN_A5, etc. But, as hard as I've tried, I cant find anything, anywhere, that tells me what pin name (PIN_G3, etc) is associated with which physical pin on the device (ie: the prototyping area on the right hand side of the picture). 

 

Thanks in advance, 

Sean
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Altera_Forum
Honored Contributor II
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--- Quote Start ---  

originally posted by begleysm@Mar 19 2006, 05:38 PM 

hi, 

 

i ordered a nios ii eval kit from altera recently, it looks like this: 

http://www.altera.com/products/devkits/images/n2eval_cyc_sml.jpg  

http://www.altera.com/products/devkits/alt..._eval_1c12.html (http://www.altera.com/products/devkits/altera/kit-nios_eval_1c12.html

i am wanting to drive an lcd using 11 of the user definable pins set to output mode.  i've made a project, i have a built a system in the sopc builder based off of an altera tutorial that has a nios ii soft processor code, jtag uart, a pio core, and few other objects.  in quartus ii i've got my sopc system on a block diagram with input and ouput pins attached.  my problem is related to the pin assignment.  i can see where i can assign pints to pin_g3, or pin_a5, etc.  but, as hard as i've tried, i cant find anything, anywhere, that tells me what pin name (pin_g3, etc) is associated with which physical pin on the device (ie: the prototyping area on the right hand side of the picture). 

 

thanks in advance, 

sean 

<div align='right'><{post_snapback}> (index.php?act=findpost&pid=13589) 

--- quote end ---  

 

--- Quote End ---  

 

 

The traditional way of doing this is to open/print out the board schematic. You should be able to trace the desired user I/O pin back to the FPGA "symbol" in the schematic and note the corresponding FPGA pin, e.g. "A5", which you&#39;d then assign in Quartus, e.g. "Pin_A5".  

 

Quite frankly, this is an okay process if you just have a few pins, but it is error prone and I&#39;d recomend printing out the schematic and going over it with a highlighter to avoid mistakes. Troubleshooting a mis-assigned pin is no fun, so double-check as you go. 

 

A relatively new feature in SOPC Builder gets past this - the board component/description editor, which reads a board netlist and then correlates peripheral I/O on the board with FPGA pins automatically; make the computer do the error-pront work. This is provided for most Altera dev boards, pre-configured.. but, sadly, it has not been provided for the 1C12 eval board (sorry!).
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Altera_Forum
Honored Contributor II
462 Views

The traditional way of doing this is to open/print out the board schematic. You should be able to trace the desired user I/O pin back to the FPGA "symbol" in the schematic and note the corresponding FPGA pin, e.g. "A5", which you&#39;d then assign in Quartus, e.g. "Pin_A5".  

 

Quite frankly, this is an okay process if you just have a few pins, but it is error prone and I&#39;d recomend printing out the schematic and going over it with a highlighter to avoid mistakes. Troubleshooting a mis-assigned pin is no fun, so double-check as you go. 

 

A relatively new feature in SOPC Builder gets past this - the board component/description editor, which reads a board netlist and then correlates peripheral I/O on the board with FPGA pins automatically; make the computer do the error-pront work. This is provided for most Altera dev boards, pre-configured.. but, sadly, it has not been provided for the 1C12 eval board (sorry!). 

<div align='right'><{post_snapback}> (index.php?act=findpost&pid=13696)</div> 

 

--- Quote End ---  

 

 

I have the same eval board, but can&#39;t find the schematic on either one of the 2 cd&#39;s they set me with the board. Do you have any idea where I can get the schematic..
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Altera_Forum
Honored Contributor II
462 Views

Sean, 

 

perhaps it helps when you import the pin assignments from the original development board design. In e.g. <NIOSDIR>\examples\verilog\niosII_cyclone_1c20\full_featured\ you&#39;ll find a .qsf file which contains all the pin assignments as &#39;set_location_assignment PIN_XX ...&#39;. You can copy these lines into your own .qsf file and then label your pins to PROTO1_IO[] or PROTO2_IO[]
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