Embedded Design Handbook

ID 683689
Date 8/28/2023
Public
Document Table of Contents

5.2. Nios® II Processor Booting Methods

There are a few methods to boot up Nios® II processor in Intel FPGA devices. The methods to boot up Nios® II processor varies according to the flash memory selection.
Table 26.  Supported Flash Memories with respective Boot Options
Supported Boot Memories Nios® II Booting Options Application Code Storage Application Runtime Location Boot Copier
On-Chip Flash (UFM in Intel® MAX® 10 FPGA devices only) Nios® II processor application execute-in-place from On-chip Flash (UFM) UFM UFM (XIP) + OCRAM/ External RAM (for writable data sections) Enable alt_load () function
Nios® II processor application copied from UFM to RAM using boot copier UFM OCRAM/ External RAM Memcpy-based boot copier
EPCQ Flash Nios® II processor application execute-in-place from EPCQ flash EPCQ flash EPCQ flash (XIP) + OCRAM/ External RAM (for writable data sections) Enable alt_load () function
Nios® II processor application copied from EPCQ flash to RAM using boot copier EPCQ flash OCRAM/ External RAM Memcpy-based boot copier
QSPI Flash (applies to any FPGA with a soft QSPI Controller or Generic Serial Flash Interface Intel FPGA IP) Nios® II processor application execute-in-place from QSPI flash QSPI flash (Configuration / General Purpose) QSPI flash (XIP) + OCRAM/ External RAM (for writable data sections) Enable alt_load () function
Nios® II processor application copied from QSPI flash to RAM using boot copier QSPI flash (Configuration / General Purpose) OCRAM/ External RAM Memcpy-based boot copier
On-chip Memory (OCRAM) Nios® II processor application execute-in-place from OCRAM OCRAM OCRAM No boot copier required
CFI Flash Nios® II processor application execute-in-place from CFI flash CFI flash CFI flash (XIP) + OCRAM/ External RAM (for writable data sections) Enable alt_load () function
Nios® II processor application copied from CFI flash to RAM using boot copier CFI flash OCRAM/ External RAM Memcpy-based boot copier
Figure 46.  Nios® II Boot Flow