1. Home
  2. Field-Programmable Gate Arrays
  3. Choose between Cyclone II and Spartan II

Choose between Cyclone II and Spartan II

Hi All,

I am starting a new project for a software defined radio using FPGA. I plan to use simulink and HDL coder with model based design. So far I have narrowed down the hardware to cyclone II EP2C70 or Spartan-3A XC3SD3400A.

Here is information I have collected:

Cost: Cyclone II, board: DE2-70, $329 (education), EP2C70: 256$ or more minimum order of 1 (from Digi-key).

Spartan 3A, can't find a board with XC3SD3400A. Closest one would be XtremeDSP Development platform board: 1695$ (Board only), chip $67 or more with minimum order of 84 (from Digi-key)

My question is what is the true cost of Cyclone II and Spartan 3A in volume of 1000?

Software: I also welcome comments on the experiences using simulink with Xilinx and Altera software. I also plan to use their Nios II or Microblaze. Any comment on the performance?

Thanks a lot in advance,

Everett

Everett Wang Ph.D. Professor, College of Information Engineering Guangdong University of Technology Guangzhou, China

Reply to
Everett
Loading thread data ...

Everett

Have a look at Hollybush2

formatting link
and our XC3SD3400A Coprocessor Module
formatting link
rocessor-board/ for XC3SD3400A based boards. Our Merrick1 also has this chip but it's a bit of an extreme board for your application.

As to chip pricing that will vary a lot and the only way to be sure is to get pricing from your local distributor.

John Adair Enterpo> Hi All,

e
Reply to
John Adair

Why so old parts? You can get development board with 5-6 times higher DSP power (considering the differences in attainable frequency) for about the same price:

formatting link
ryNo=3D139&No=3D502

Cyclone II still may be (just may be) valuable at very low end (EP2C5 and EP2C8), but certainly not at 70K LEs size. At that size Cyclone III is plain better. Not sure how Cyclone III and Cyclone IV E compare to each other.

Reply to
Michael S

ElectronDepot website is not affiliated with any of the manufacturers or service providers discussed here. All logos and trade names are the property of their respective owners.