1. Home
  2. Field-Programmable Gate Arrays
  3. Req: (Free) Embedded Platforms for Education

Req: (Free) Embedded Platforms for Education

Hi all,

First of all I just joined this group so let me salute all members !!

I have a request and I would be happy is someone could help.

You all probably know that embedded systems are more and more considered as hot topics to be though at universities. I will be in charge of managing a complete course for graduate students on embedded system with a focus on software engineering and operating systems for embedded platforms.

Since having only a theoretical course is quite a boring activity : ) I am looking for the best platform students can experiment and play with (doing labs, projects and so on)

Obviously, free and open source platforms are privileged since this is an education purpose in a university that cannot afford paying money for licences; or even managing a complex relation with an industrial partner with some 'discounts' on licences.

So if anyone has a suggestion I would be happy to know about it. At the end of the process, I'll send a table summarising all the suggestions so other people/teachers could benefit from it.

Kind regards,

Reply to
gouaich
Loading thread data ...

formatting link
formatting link
formatting link

HTH., Syms.

Reply to
Symon

For hardware you really can't beat the Xilinx/Digilent S3E-500 boards for price (USD$150 retail) and capability. 3-bit VGA out (can be hacked up to more bits), LCD char display, LEDs, switches, ADC/DAC, ethernet, and lots of memory.

You may have a case to make to the Xilinx University Program for a donation - go to

formatting link

This board will do both elementry digital logic teachuing as well as CPU / system-on-chip, embedded OS projects.

I'm biased, but in terms of OS, you can run Linux (2.4 and 2.6) on it with a freely available HW/SW development environment

formatting link
There is an active community and mailing list.

The only thing I don't like about these boards is the USB programming model, if you are using Linux as your host development environment, the USB driver is a bit flakey. Once you get it setup it's ok, but there can be some frustration early on. Look to the archives of this NG for ways people have got around that with open source USB drivers.

Regards,

John

Reply to
John Williams

There are a number of companies that have either reduced cost, or free, tools for academic use. We do special deals on our development boards. Our partners Aldec, Synplicity and Xilinx have development tools available under university programs. Some details of our university program and some of joint offerings with our partners here

formatting link

John Adair Enterpo> Hi all,

Reply to
John Adair

I am using the Xilinx ML403 board. It is not cheap but it has everything on board. I am writing a tutorial on how to use this board to implement my own design. Read more here:

formatting link

Sven

Reply to
svenand

svenand a écrit :

Thnx Sven,

It looks very interesting !!

Reply to
gouaich

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.