FPGA development board

You can get started with an FPGA board that is under GPL:

Martin

---------------------------------------------- JOP - a Java Processor core for FPGAs:

easy! 2M Gates FPGA platform for $49, cant go lower than that! :)

there are some DIY FPGA boards with all manufacturing files (gerber) but doing a single proto is more costly than buying a board.

Yes and No. Microcontrollers usually need to be programmed with object code for some the microcontroller. FPGA needs to be programmed to be anything, this can be single wire or and gate or microcontroller. once you have some microcontroller in the FPGA you can program the controller with proper object code.

in many cases 4 wires to LPT port is sufficent to program an FPGA

there is special offer for 2 boards for $99

if you need more than that, the wait for the Xilinx S3-1500 low cost to be announced, it has more goodies,

if you really want todo it yourself, try ebay shopping to get some FPGA for very cheap, attach power supply and jtag header, but the time/effort spent doesnt actually justify that in most cases.

Antti

Xilinx has a $99 kit that is ideal for your purposes.

Leon

--
Leon Heller, G1HSM
http://www.geocities.com/leon_heller
http://www.kasamba.com/viewExpert.asp?conMemID=105725&Catid=1111&banID=2100

Here's a pointer:

Given that you are just getting started, I think you would be best off buying your first board, rather than getting distracted on building a board (which given your cost sensitivity, is going to be more expensive that buying one of the low cost boards).

Most of the cheap boards use chips that are supported by the free software from the FPGA vendors.

I would recommend you look at something with a Xilinx Spartan-2 or Spartan-3 chip.

Philip

=================== Philip Freidin snipped-for-privacy@fpga-faq.com Host for

Thanks everyone.

I saw this page

quite interesting. Now I think getting started with CPLD is not a bad idea. As you said there, FPGA is probably not ideal for learning PLD, so your CPLD proto board is pulling my attention!

I have few questions regarding your XC9536 proto board,

1.Is XC9536 still available, I mean to say(in case) they are obsolete by now?

2.How may time can I reprogram it, since it is flash memory based? Is there any equivalent SRAM based device, so that I can program it again and again?

3.I need a Xilinx parallel download cable to program it, right?

4.What is frequency of crystal oscillator? Which sort to crystal oscillator is this one, having six pins(as shown in the layout)? Till now I dealt only two pin crystals!

5.Sorry to say, your PCB layout is missing some tracks of PLCC socket. Can you please upload it again.

Thanks a lot.

Hey Leon where you, I need your help!!

I have one more query

According to my text book, if your design needs large numbers of flip-flops you should so for a FPGA instead of CPLD, but you can use CPLD for lesser flip-flops demanding design. So I want to know about their relative figures, also can I design 4bit counters, ripple counter, ring counter, Johnson counter etc, on his CPLD?

Thanks again

Like Leon pointed out

Xilinx spartan3 starter kit for US$99

also coolrunner2 starter kit for US$49

both are made by digilentinc for xilinx. Digilent also make addon boards like ethernet and usb(to connect to pc)

system boards peripheral boards

Xess make some boards

As do lots of others

Jean sells some boards

Tony Burch

Altium Livedesign boards US$99

can be programs from either inside protel or from the fpga vendor tools

lots of others out there

Alex

I was expecting Leon to solve my query! It appears that he is out or no more interested in me.

BTW, I got answer to all the questions except one: What is the frequency to crystal oscillator used here

, it is mentioned no where! I'm still in a hope that some one will help me! I think is should be 50Mhz?but not sure.

Thanks