Design tools comparison between Xilinx, Altera and Lattice for FPGA designs

"Luc" schrieb im Newsbeitrag news: snipped-for-privacy@4ax.com...

For Xilinx, Modelsim comes in a seperate module, but its also free (AFAIK full simulation speed up to 10000 VHDL lines, wow)

Regards Falk

ISE Webpack is definitly better choice than Altera Web Edition. Web Edition does not generate image files (pof. and sof.). In additional ISE Webpcack has minimal limitations and only big disadvantage is core generator which is not included in the Webpack. It means you can not use Xilinx FIFO, DP RAM,... but anywhere you have PLL (DCM)... Synthisiser XST is also very good and in most case you dont need it Leonardo or Synplify... Free Simulator tool (Xilinx Modelsim ) is also avaiable with ISE Webpack....

In the other words you can do it much more with ISE Webpack...

Regards ,

Amir

Actually Quartus web edition does allow you to generate programming files, for certain Altera devices. An exact list can be seen here:

Also there is no limitation to the cores you can use with the free Altera tools.. if you want a RAM you've got it.. if you want a PLL you've got it. The SOPC Builder system integration/bus generation tool is included for free.

There is also the Nios II evaluation download that includes a lot of free-IP, and a time-limited (or unlimited-time-but-tethered-to-host) Nios II core for your evaluation.

Jesse Kempa Altera jkempa -at- altera --dot-- com

May I suggest also another approach?

Do a comparison of the distributors as well...

Here in this country (live abroad now for 3 years ;o) the best support I got was from:

- Altera distributor

- Actel distributor

- Lattice (direct country office)

Worst experience with Xilinx distributor...after 2 - 3 years of hearing them always talking that they are better than Altera.

At the end the stomach decides as well...and I prefer the distributor who can provide good support/samples...as nowadays most support is forwarded to local FAE's.

rick

Hi Luc,

You should be the expert on the Lattice kit, so I won't comment on that.

Quartus Web Edition includes QIS - which is "Quartus Integrated Synthesis", which by now is a pretty decent VHDL/Verilog synthesis tool - and that's coming from someone who used to do tech support for Leonardo.

Also, as you stated, Quartus Web Edition indeed has support for, but does not _include_ an RTL simulator. However, it does include a built-in gate-level (functional or timing) simulator, which can also do parts of the design's power analysis.

I also understand that there's a hugely crippled, but free version of Modelsim that you can get from Xilinx (this must cost them a fortune), but which, as long as you only code RTL, you can also use for Lattice, Altera, Actel and whichever other vendor, as long as you initially mentally intend to target a Xilinx ;-) However, I haven't read the EULA to the letter.

Best regards,

Ben

As Jesse mentioned, Altera's Quartus II Web Edition does in fact generate .pof and .sof programming image files and includes everythiong need to design for Altera's latest CPLD and low-cost FPGA device families. Quartus II Web Edition includes the Quartus II integrated synthesis feature and will work with all of the leading third-party synthesis tools on the market.

Quartus II Web Edition in fact includes most of the same features included in the subscription version minus some device support for the largest high-density FPGA devices and HardCopy Structured ASICs. A comparison between Quartus II Web Edition and Quartus II subscription edition software can be viewed on the Altera web site at

Quartus II Web Edition also supports Altera's OpenCore Plus evaluation IP so you can configure and evaluate IP in hardware before purchasing an IP license. OpenCore Plus IP can be downloaded from the Altera IP MegaStore at

I hope this information is helpful to you.

Regards, Rob Kruger rkruger-at-altera.com

Perhaps you've been using a version of Quartus Web Edition from long before I started looking at FPGAs...

QII web edition can do pretty much everything the "full" edition can do except really big designs - if you are looking for medium or large Stratix I/II chips, logic region locking, RTL viewing, and a few other big design features, you'll need the full pack. Otherwise, the web edition will do it all. I also get the impression that steadily more features get moved from the "full" edition down to the web edition - it's not long ago that physical synthesis for register retiming was full edition only.

About the only thing missing from the web edition is a Linux version - I expect that will come soon, though, now that there is a free Linux version of the Xilinx tools...