best fpga development board?

[geoffrey wall]

Im looking to do some real-time video processing algorithms,
but i am mostly a software person... i need an fpga with good
development tools (not buggy) that will be easy to use for someone who
is learning how to program hdl and use the hardware for the first time.
Ideally i would like a powerful and flexible board with good development
tools, good tech support and documentation. Any suggestions?

thanks

 

[Symon]

Hi Geoffrey,
I saw your posting on comp.dsp, I guess you've decided on the FPGA route?
So, for boards and other goodies go to Philip's excellent
http://www.fpga-faq.com/ . I've used a board from www.xess.com to do the
stuff you're talking about. It did what they said it would!
Good luck, Syms.
"geoffrey wall" <wallge@eng.fsu.edu> wrote in message
news:c82o6r$g2m$1@news.fsu.edu...

Im looking to do some real-time video processing algorithms,
but i am mostly a software person... i need an fpga with good
development tools (not buggy) that will be easy to use for someone who
is learning how to program hdl and use the hardware for the first time.
Ideally i would like a powerful and flexible board with good development
tools, good tech support and documentation. Any suggestions?

thanks

 

[geoffrey wall]

actually, i think we are going to try both solutions(dsp and fpga) and
see how they compare with each other. thanks for the feedback.

Symon wrote:

Hi Geoffrey,
I saw your posting on comp.dsp, I guess you've decided on the FPGA route?
So, for boards and other goodies go to Philip's excellent
http://www.fpga-faq.com/ . I've used a board from www.xess.com to do the
stuff you're talking about. It did what they said it would!
Good luck, Syms.
"geoffrey wall" <wallge@eng.fsu.edu> wrote in message
news:c82o6r$g2m$1@news.fsu.edu...

Im looking to do some real-time video processing algorithms,
but i am mostly a software person... i need an fpga with good
development tools (not buggy) that will be easy to use for someone who
is learning how to program hdl and use the hardware for the first time.
Ideally i would like a powerful and flexible board with good development
tools, good tech support and documentation. Any suggestions?

thanks

 

[Jon Beniston]

i need an fpga with good
development tools (not buggy)

You're hoping! IMHO, you should stear well clear of Xilinx's XST.. It
has a nasty habbit of synthesizing bad logic. Agggh! It's even
screwing me as I right this. The alternatives aren't cheap (synplify
for example), but are better.

Cheers,
JonB

 

[Tom Seim]

geoffrey wall <wallge@eng.fsu.edu> wrote in message news:<c82o6r$g2m$1@news.fsu.edu>...

Im looking to do some real-time video processing algorithms,
but i am mostly a software person... i need an fpga with good
development tools (not buggy) that will be easy to use for someone who
is learning how to program hdl and use the hardware for the first time.
Ideally i would like a powerful and flexible board with good development
tools, good tech support and documentation. Any suggestions?

What ever you do, don't buy ANYTHING from Nu Horizons. Their customer
service sucks! And they discontinue products with no notice.

 

[Alex Gibson]

"geoffrey wall" <wallge@eng.fsu.edu> wrote in message
news:c82o6r$g2m$1@news.fsu.edu...

Im looking to do some real-time video processing algorithms,
but i am mostly a software person... i need an fpga with good
development tools (not buggy) that will be easy to use for someone who
is learning how to program hdl and use the hardware for the first time.
Ideally i would like a powerful and flexible board with good development
tools, good tech support and documentation. Any suggestions?

thanks

A different question to ask is
what is the budget for an fpga board ?

And what size do you need ?

For lower end boards take a look at
www.digilentinc.com


Have you guys had a look at the Anlog devices
black fin boards ?

http://www.analogdevices.com/Analog_Root/static/promotions/blackfin750/?CT=adi_webcastad2_homepage.gif

http://www.analogdevices.com/processors/epProductPage/0,2542,BF533%252DHARDWARE,00.htm

http://www.analogdevices.com/processors/epProductPage/0,2542,BF561%252DHARDWARE,00.htm

 

[Rajeev]

geoffrey wall <wallge@eng.fsu.edu> wrote in message news:<c830uc$ha1$1@news.fsu.edu>...

actually, i think we are going to try both solutions(dsp and fpga) and
see how they compare with each other. thanks for the feedback.

I'll be interested to hear your conclusions.

I did a design study for my application a couple of years ago. Pentium
vs DSP vs FPGA. The application did not leap out at me as a no-brainer
for the FPGA -- processing of data packets, what I would call general
scientific computation including division, straight-line fit and some
minimization. The figure of merit was processing rate (packets per
second) per dollar. And I certainly made a number of hand-waving
assumptions in my estimation. Yet (to my surprise) the Pentium and DSP
chip came out roughly equivalent. The FPGA won by a factor of 5. Now
development effort is another story...

Regards,
-rajeev-

 

[Jesse Kempa]

geoffrey wall <wallge@eng.fsu.edu> wrote in message news:<c82o6r$g2m$1@news.fsu.edu>...

Im looking to do some real-time video processing algorithms,
but i am mostly a software person... i need an fpga with good
development tools (not buggy) that will be easy to use for someone who
is learning how to program hdl and use the hardware for the first time.
Ideally i would like a powerful and flexible board with good development
tools, good tech support and documentation. Any suggestions?

thanks

I normally don't plug my employer's products, but what you're asking
for is covered quite nicely by the embedded dev kits from Altera as
well as from our partner Microtronix. I suggest this approach as
putting processor core(s) on the FPGA is very simple these days; for
someone with software experience this can make getting started with
hardware design a bit more simple as a processor allows you to bring
up a design/debug/interface to your hardware with familiar means
(software dev. & debug). Also consider a soft-processor has terrific
potential for controlling the various hardware processing blocks in a
design very easily.

Also note that with any of these products you aren't required to use
the processor; they're really just FPGA dev. boards with additional
design tools/IP/RTOS support in the box.

http://www.microtronix.com/
http://www.altera.com/products/ip/processors/nios/kits/nio-dev_kits.html

Jesse Kempa
Altera Corp.
jkempa at altera dot com

 

[Kenneth Land]

"Jesse Kempa" <kempaj@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:95776079.0405160944.ecb0ac@posting.google.com...

geoffrey wall <wallge@eng.fsu.edu> wrote in message
news:<c82o6r$g2m$1@news.fsu.edu>...
Im looking to do some real-time video processing algorithms,
but i am mostly a software person... i need an fpga with good
development tools (not buggy) that will be easy to use for someone who
is learning how to program hdl and use the hardware for the first time.
Ideally i would like a powerful and flexible board with good development
tools, good tech support and documentation. Any suggestions?

thanks

I normally don't plug my employer's products, but what you're asking
for is covered quite nicely by the embedded dev kits from Altera as
well as from our partner Microtronix. I suggest this approach as
putting processor core(s) on the FPGA is very simple these days; for
someone with software experience this can make getting started with
hardware design a bit more simple as a processor allows you to bring
up a design/debug/interface to your hardware with familiar means
(software dev. & debug). Also consider a soft-processor has terrific
potential for controlling the various hardware processing blocks in a
design very easily.

Also note that with any of these products you aren't required to use
the processor; they're really just FPGA dev. boards with additional
design tools/IP/RTOS support in the box.

http://www.microtronix.com/
http://www.altera.com/products/ip/processors/nios/kits/nio-dev_kits.html

Jesse Kempa
Altera Corp.
jkempa at altera dot com

I'll second Jesse's recommendations. I'm an EE, but have been primarily
involved in software. When I and another software guy went to a free class
on the Altera Nios running on the Cyclone devkit board we were instantly
hooked. The tools and the workflow are very familiar to a software
engineer.

Do a google and google groups search if you want more details.

Ken