Yes, I believe that may be why it didn't work on the RIO device setup.
So I am able to upload the bitfile to the flash.
That's great and all but I still don't understand why, with the Kintec 7 FPGA (PXIe 7975R), I can't go about Opening the FPGA reference without going through uploading the bitfile to the flash.
WIth the Virtex 5 FPGA (PXIe 7965R) that I have, I'm able to Open the FPGA reference without going through all these steps. It would be best if I didn't have to upload every new bitfile to the flash since I'm working with multiple compiles at one time.