I was making the point that you can hardly compare the availablility of a mature product that's in full production with one that's just being released, which is what this thread's discussion has been about.
Why aren't you using 10KXXXs? They were available years ago.
You can get SpartanIIs. Now.
A better comparison will be to wait and see how Altera handles the relase of CycloneII next year.
Nial.
------------------------------------------------ Nial Stewart Developments Ltd FPGA and High Speed Digital Design
Seems like they have read your message. Anyway, in my eyes they should respond without this little help from you :-)
And about availability: someone could get SW model of chip and work with it for a year (till final version of code). Someone needs to put this chip into excessive real-time testing - because there is NO CHANCE to simulate my _whole_ design (where the fpga is the only one component of system) - and this is the reason why I'm in need of _real_ parts. Of course, these 'early' parts can be engineering samples, not from full production (if I got the differences between them). I'm not using zilions of parts? When I start to use such quantities, I'd go to asic world :-)
Let me set the record straight on the Cyclone front. Altera delivered over 50,000 units of each device into customer and distribution partners within the first 1-3 months of each device shipping. Devices transitioned from ES to production in less than two months for each device. Every single device shipped to customers ahead of the schedule we that committed to customers via our announcements, our sales team and www site. We are currently approaching the 1 millionth unit shipped in the family. This in only 12 months from first silicon shipment. For the record, that shipment is < 3 months ahead of first Spartan 3 shipment (at least from public claims)
The bottom line is that all five devices in the family are in volume production, available off the shelf to anyone who wants them. Additionally, we have multiple customers taking thousands of units per month. If you need low-cost FPGAs in any volume and regardless of the size of your company, Cyclone is ready to go when you are.
Apparently you didn't know that Cyclone and Spartan 3 are contemporaries? Both are new products just being released, and squarely aimed at low-cost markets. Both were introduced to the public about the same time, to much fanfare and to ambitious pricing and availability schedules.
The key difference is that Altera met or beat their advertised schedules, whereas Xilinx has consistently missed their targets, and their schedules continue to slip. You can buy a promise, or you can buy a part.
Again, you make my point by calling Cyclone a "mature product that's in full production". Not bad for a product that is just being released. They've done a pretty good job if you think of new Cyclone parts as "mature" already. Altera is building a good track record regarding what they say and what they actually deliver. Not perfect, as shown by their recent backpeddling on some Stratix termination features, but still very, very respectable.
Lastly, I expect I'll be able to get Cyclone 2 in production quantites long before you ever see any Spartan 4's (or whatever they call the succesor to S3), which is what they'll be competing against. Hopefully Cyclone 2 will roll out as smoothly as Cyclone 1's did. The odds favor it.
Patrick MacGregor wrote: : Apparently you didn't know that Cyclone and Spartan 3 are contemporaries? : Both are new products just being released, and squarely aimed at low-cost : markets. Both were introduced to the public about the same time, to much : fanfare and to ambitious pricing and availability schedules.
Cyclone was announced Sep 2002, Spartan April 2003. When where Cyclone available from distributors?
Xilinx has done this before with delivery dates...Nothing new, and yep, the big customers get first dibs on everything. Spartan III is not on ship hold and the typical ramp-ups that I saw all the way back to the 4K family are issues again. Now I design a dual foot-print (if I can) or a integration path to the wonderful new part promised to me by our vendor. So be patient kids, Santa will show up with the goodies! The distributers are relaying bullshit stories told to them by Xilinx, who, always get there with the parts eventually.
Your dictionary must have a different definition of 'contemporary' than mine.
Cyclone samples were available last February.
I wouldn't argue with this.
The thread was about availability of devices which are _currently_ being released and you said you use Altera devices because you can get devices which have been out for nearly a year.
The same argument could be used for Xilinx becasue SpartanIIs are freely available.
The Altera parts still don't have a workable equivalent of the Xilinx SRL-16, which can be used to huge advantage in DSP applications...if you code to it. Otherwise, I'd agree.
--
--Ray Andraka, P.E. President, the Andraka Consulting Group, Inc.
They don't make very dense DA LUTs for distributed arithmetic filters. The M512s only give you 9 taps vs 4 with an SRL16, and there are a lot less of them than LEs. They also don't help you for reloadable LUTs, which I use as a poor-man's reconfiguration (I use SRL16's for the DA LUTs in xilinx to permit me to make a reloadable DA filter, as well as for a DA adaptive filter).
The shifters work f> Ray Andraka wrote:
--
--Ray Andraka, P.E. President, the Andraka Consulting Group, Inc.
I don't follow you point about reloadability. How are M512 less reloadable than SRL16? For me, they are more reloadable, in the sense that unlike SRL16 M512 allows random-access reload. The point about density is also questionable. In the absence of hard data I would guess that one M512s is physically smaller than 20 SRL16 it replaces in DA applications. Of course the point about moderate total amount of M512 vs. enormous amount of SRL16 is hard to argue.
A DA LUT contains all the possible sums of the input taps, which for a serial filter is one tap per address bit. As you increase the number of taps, the corresponding table size grows exponentially. With LUTs, you get 4 taps per LUT (which you can do with LE's provided you don't need to reload the LUTs). If you have to reload them, then using an M512 only gives you 9 taps per M512, and each M512 is associated with a number of LABs, each containing 10 LEs. Thus the density of a reloadable DA LUT using the DA_LUTs is considerably lower than what you'd get if using LEs.
Yes, the M512 is reloadable, I am not disputing that. My point is that it is not a substitute for reloadable LUTs in the LEs. The densities simply do not compare.
Michael S wrote:
M512s
than
poor-man's
make a
the
SRL-16,
it.
--
--Ray Andraka, P.E. President, the Andraka Consulting Group, Inc.
You have never read Stratix datasheet and have no idea what is M512. Understandably, I prefer the 2nd option.
Nobody in his right mind will use M512 for DA in 512x1b configuration, like you suggest. The natural configuration would be 32x16b or 32x18b. In such configurations one M512 provides 25% more DA bandwidth than 16 (or 18, depending on required precision) SRL16 cells. So we can say that one M512 replaces 20 (or 22.5) SRL16 cells. Additionally, each shift-accumulate block is amortized over 25% more taps, providing additional space saving. Taking all this into account, I don't believe that M512 is less dense than SRL16. Less available - probably yes, but not less dense.
I'm speaking of density on the device scale. I agree, if you look just at the M512, then you have a denser filter than if you look at the equivalent number of LUTs. When you look at the device scale, you don't have very many M512s relative to the number of LUTs. I am familiar with the Stratix, and did a careful comparative analysis for one of the FPGA vendors between tbe Stratix and Virtex architectures. That vendor also was not aware of all that could be done with the SRL16.
Also, yes, you would use it in the widest configurations to get the most efficient use. As a
32x16 you are effectively equivalent to 30 SRL16s plus a 16 bit adder. With DA, you > > A DA LUT contains all the possible sums of the input taps, which for a
serial filter is
corresponding table size
with LE's
then using an
number of LABs,
DA_LUTs is
--
--Ray Andraka, P.E. President, the Andraka Consulting Group, Inc.
Richard Temple wrote: : jerry1111 wrote : in message news:... : > >Aye, but to be fair, how long has Cyclone been out now? : > : > But you were able to buy small quantities early... not after : > a year - IMHO.
: Also, dont forget that the Cyclone performs better in benchmarking : than SpartanIII in terms of power and raw clock speed, despite not : being 90nm...
How can you judge power and raw clock speed of Spartan III, while the parts are not available yet?
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