Silicon Devices - Others

[hgleamon1]

Hello,

Having looked through XAPP951, XAPP1020 and UG380, I'm not sure that I fully understand that an SPI Flash (probably going to be a Spansion S25FL032P) can be used as User Storage post-configuration WITHOUT having to instantiate a STARTUP primitive (like in Virtex-5) or provide secondary lines to the Flash device (probably needing some tristating arrangement and various pullups).

So, my question is, can I connect the SPI Flash to the FPGA as suggested by UG380 for master serial configuration and then, in the .ucf, connect the outputs from an XPS SPI IP to the requisite pins (MOSI, DIN, CSO_B, CCLK as user i/o) to drive the Flash after configuration?

Diagram attached for clarification.

Thanks in advance.

Howard

[bhayes47 · Accepted solution]

Hi Howard,
I have this working, so I can say this absolutely works with Spartan 6, there is no need for additional primitives.
Bill

[hgleamon1]

Good news. Thanks Bill.

Regards,

Howard

[x99699]

Hi,

By assuming the SPI FLASH can be used as User Storage post-configuration, I guess I can also drive the Flash after configuration to OVERWRITE the current configuration ?

Actually, I would like to have "Post-Configuration Access" to the SPI FLASH (like described in XAPP1020 for Virtex-5 : http://www.xilinx.com/support/documentation/application_notes/xapp1020.pdf) to update the configuration Flash memory remotely over ethernet. Anyone experimented that with SPartan-6 ? Any help would be most welcome !

[hgleamon1]

You should probably have started a new thread, referencing this one, as this is marked as solved. However, a quick answer - I have used both multiboot and post-config access to the flash to write new config data to different areas of the memory for remote updating. It works.

Start a new thread if you something specific to ask.

Regards,

Howard