MiSTer FPGA on the DE10-Nano

Nix McRetro // 4th April 2020 // Programming

I finally got around to putting together my MiSTer FPGA. Below is a list of all the things I bought to get it into one piece. Sadly the case I so desire just is never in stock so I’ve just gone with an open design for the time being. Eventually it would be nice to have it wrapped up neatly but we can’t have nice things these days, can we?

Hardware

Terasic DE10-Nano
Noctua 40mm NF-A4x10 5V fan
128MB SDRAM XSD (v2.5)
I/O board (v6.0)
PCB bottom plate
Wi-Fi dongle
Bluetooth dongle
USB hub (v1.2)
USB bridge connector (long)
solid copper heatsink
real-time clock board (v1.3)
audio tape input (v1.1)
USB bracket connector
5V 4A power supply
inline power switch
power-supply splitter cable

Overall I was very impressed with the hardware, enough that I had started selling off original consoles and related FPGA carts such as my Terraonion gear. Playing Earth Defence Force on the Super Famicom, you really get hit by slowdown when too many sprites are dancing around the screen, which tends to happen in a shmup. On my setup the same slowdown appeared in the same sort of places on MiSTer, which absolutely made my day. Way past cool!

AI-assisted revision: This post was reviewed and edited with OpenAI GPT-5.6 Sol on 1 October 2026 for fact-checking, sourcing, and editorial cleanup. Final editorial responsibility remains with the author.