You may see this error when compiling large designs targeting high density devices using the Quartus® II 32-bit software. Compiling high density designs may consume greater than the 2 to 3 GB of memory resources available per process on 32-bit operating systems. To resolve this issue, use the Quartus II 64-bit software with a 64-bit operating system.
Refer to the Quartus II device support release notes (PDF) for the memory requirements of Altera devices.
To verify if you are using the Quartus II 64-bit software, on the Help menu click About Quartus II. The window should show "Quartus II 64-Bit Version <number>".
If you are using a Windows-based 64-bit operating system, you can switch to the 64-bit software as follows:
- Launch Quartus II (64-Bit) from its desktop shortcut or the program menu listing
If you are using a Linux 64-bit operating system, follow one of these steps to switch to the 64-bit software:
- Set an environment variable called QUARTUS_64BIT to 1 and launch the Quartus II software
- setenv QUARTUS_64BIT 1
- Launch the Quartus II software with the --64bit command line option:
- quartus --64bit