Altera provides a hardware system called the Media Computer for both the DE1 and DE2 boards. At the heart of this system is a Nios II microprocessor that connects to most of the peripherals on the board.. The Nios II is a microprocessor designed by Altera specifically for implementation on FPGA devices. The Media Computer is loaded on the DE1/DE2 boards by the Altera Monitor Program, availabe as part of the University Program installation.
From a software developer point of view, the Media Computer is identical for both the DE2 and DE1 board except obviously where the actual peripherals differ. Below is the list of board peripherals used by the Nios II system for both the DE2 and DE1 board with the differences marked with an asterisk (*). Note there are differences between the boards not listed here since we only report differences that affect the Media Computer system.
| DE2 | DE1 |
| 9 Green LEDs | *8 Green LEDs |
| 18 Red LEDs | *10 Red LEDs |
| 8 7-segment Digits | *4 7-segment Digits |
| 18 Slide Switches | *10 Slide Switches |
| 4 Push-buttons | 4 Push-buttons |
| 8MB SDRAM | 8MB SDRAM |
| 512KB SRAM | 512KB SRAM |
| 4MB Flash RAM | 4MB Flash RAM |
| Audio Codec | Audio Codec |
| VGA Output Adapter | VGA Output Adapter |
| PS/2 port | PS/2 port |
| 2 40-pin Expansion Headers | 2 40-pin Expansion Headers |
| RS-232 transceiver | RS-232 transceiver |