Blink for Altera Cyclone II EP2C5T144 Mini Development board

This is a very tiny Quartus II project that shows the bare minimum configuration you need to be able to design FPGA logic programs, run them on the chip, and even store them in the on board EEPROM (If your board isn't the cheapest version that has no EPCS4 memory chip on the bottom of it).

I'll write more here when I get a chance. Basically, you need a USB Blaster clone (I prefer the white cased one because it allows Device Discovery), and a little understanding of FPGAs and what exactly you're doing.

There are some good tutorials around on the web but I'll throw what I can in here when I get the chance.

Basic compile

ctrl-l (that's an L)

Basic pin assignment

Assignments -> Pin Planner then change the Location field. Recompile after you change pin assignments

Basic programming

Tools -> Programmer then select you hardware, then press Device Detect OR (if device detect stalls for 30 seconds) just manually add the EP2C5T144 device

Programming directly to the config memory

This is the pain in the butt. You need to convert the .pom output from your compile step to a .jic file first. Actually, all of this is described in: https://www.altera.com/en_US/pdfs/literature/an/an370.pdf

1. Open File -> Convert Programming File
2. Select JTAG Indirect Configuration File (.jic) from the Programming file type: select box
3. Select EPCS4 in the Configuration device: select box
4. Provide a File name: for the output .jic file
5. In the Input files to convert list, highlight the SOF Data and select Add File...
6. Navigate to and select the .sof file generated when you compiled the design (eg. blink01.sof). Click Open
7. Again, in the Input files to convert list, highlight the Flash Loader and select Add Device...
8. Navigate through the list of devices to find your FPGA (eg. Cyclone II and EP2C5). Click OK to select that device and go back to the Convert Programming File window
9. Click Generate to convert the .sof input to a .jic file

Now that you have a compiled .jic file, open the Programmer window, and select View -> Show Device Tree to show the details about what you're going to flash.

1. Click Add File... on th left hand side
2. Select your new .jic file
3. On the line listing your .jic file, check the Program/Configure box
4. Make sure only your new device configuration is listed.
5. Click Start to flash the .jic file to the EPCS4 flash
6. Disconnect the USB-Blaster and power cycle the board. It should load your compiled design from the flash chip and start executing it.