SignalTap II software usage steps

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foreword

Environment:
1. Quartus18.1
2. Board model: Atomic Brother Pioneer 2 (EP4CE10F17C8)
Requirements:
Can use SignalTap II for on-chip debugging.

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1. What is SignalTap II?

SignalTap II, the full name of which is SignalTap II Logic Analyzer, is a second-generation system-level debugging tool that can capture and display real-time signals. It is a powerful and practical FPGA on-chip debugging tool software. SignalTap II can select the signal to be captured, the trigger mode of capture, and the depth of data samples captured. Real-time data is provided to engineers to help debug . Eliminates the costly problem of using an external logic analyzer.

2. Use steps

• Click below to open SignalTap II
  
• composition:
  
• Double-click the empty area of ​​the node list and trigger conditions:

If the following options do not appear, click the arrow position

• Set Filer to SignalTap: pre-synthesis, and then click the List button, the signal will appear:
  
• Double-click to select the signal we want, and double-click to delete our signal (or select the signal through the middle arrow after selecting the signal):

• Click insert and then close:
  
• Here are the signals added:
  
• Solve the problem that the signal is optimized:
  1. Change the reg and wire signals into output port signals (complex) 2. Add / synthesis keep
  / next to the wire signal to be observed. For the reg signal, add / synthesis noprune /

wire [23:0] counter/*synthesis keep*/;
reg [23:0] counter/*synthesis noprune*/;

• Add sample clock:
  
• Select sys_clk:

• Set sampling depth:
  

Here we set the sampling depth to 2K. The larger the sampling depth, the longer the time range for observing the signal, but at the same time, the larger the FPGA RAM resources will be consumed.

• Click Save:
  
• Whether to add to the project:
  
• Effect:
  

We will find that there is one more stp2 file, and we will compile it in the next step

• Programming in SignalTap II
  
• Click to start analysis:
  
• Error:
  

Because the board has solidified other programs before, the current STP file cannot be burned in. We need to go out and burn the existing sof into it.

• success:
  

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3. Summary

The above are the main steps of the online debugging of the SignalTap II software that I want to introduce today.

4. References

The use of the official SignalTap logic analyzer of punctual atom