In part 1, we discussed why we need a softcore for SNESTang, and how it can use SDRAM in a way that does not disrupt the gaming core. Now we need to provide a firmware program to to make the softcore useful, like displaying a menu. In this part, let’s explore the building and loading of the RISC-V firmware to get the soft core to do useful work.

In the recently released SNESTang 0.3, a softcore-based I/O system is added to enhance the menu system and file system support. Let us explore how this works. Part one of the article discusses why the soft core is necessary, choice of CPU to use and how it works with the SDRAM.

This documents the design of SNESTang 0.3 for my own reference and others who want to read the code. It also aims to be helpful to people porting other cores to Tang FPGAs.