© April 2009 Altera Corporation USB-Blaster Download Cable User Guide
1. Setting Up the USB-Blaster Download
Cable
Introduction
The USB-Blaster™ download cable interfaces a USB port on a host computer to an
Altera
®
FPGA mounted on a printed circuit board. The cable sends configuration data
from the PC to a standard 10-pin header connected to the FPGA. You can use the
USB-Blaster cable to iteratively download configuration data to a system during
prototyping or to program data into the system during production.
Supported Devices
You can use the USB-Blaster download cable to download configuration data to the
following Altera devices:
■ Stratix
®
series FPGAs
■ Cyclone
®
series FPGAs
■ MAX
®
series CPLDs
■ Arria
®
GX series FPGAs
■ APEX
™
series FPGAs
■ ACEX
®
1K FPGAs
■ Mercury
™
FPGAs
■ FLEX 10K
®
series FPGAs
■ Excalibur
™
FPGAs
You can perform in-system programming of the following devices:
■ Altera configuration devices including EPC2 devices.
■ Enhanced configuration devices including EPC4, EPC8, and EPC16 devices.
■ Serial configuration devices including EPCS1, EPCS4, EPCS16, EPCS64, and
EPCS128 devices.
In addition, you can perform SignalTap
®
II logic analysis.
The USB-Blaster download cable supports target systems using 5.0-V TTL, 3.3-V
LVTTL/LVCMOS, and single-ended I/O standards from 1.5 V to 3.3 V.
Power Requirements
The USB-Blaster download cable requires the following power sources:
■ 5.0 V from the USB cable
■ Between 1.5 V and 5.0 V from the target circuit board