FPGA vs Microprocessor: newbie question

[José da Rocha]

Hello. <BR>
I’m new at the FPGA world. I understand that a FPGA and a microprocessor are NOT similar physical devices. (With a FPGA we can design our own digital functions) <p>I would like to know what are the main reasons to use a FPGA instead of a microprocessor in a real world application ? <BR>
Can anyone describe me some real world applications where the use of a FPGA is a more suitable solution than the use of a microprocessor and why? <p>Thank you very much for your answer <p>José da Rocha

 

[Marc Randolph]

José da Rocha wrote:

Hello.
I’m new at the FPGA world. I understand that a FPGA and a microprocessor are NOT
similar physical devices. (With a FPGA we can design our own digital functions)

I would like to know what are the main reasons to use a FPGA instead of a
microprocessor in a real world application ?
Can anyone describe me some real world applications where the use of a FPGA is a
more suitable solution than the use of a microprocessor and why?

Howdy José,

This sounds a little too much like homework, so I'm not going to
completely answer your questions. I will give you a real-world example,
and hopefully *you* can explain why the FPGA is more suitable:

Suppose you need to design a simple card whose sole purpose is to block
Ethernet packets that begin with the byte 0xFF. Assume packets are 1500
bytes long and arriving at a full gigabit Ethernet rate (nearly 1000
Mbit per second when using large packets).

Why would an FPGA be more suitable? Items of interest: data bus speed
(vs. data bus width) and the number of processor instructions and bus
cycles required to get a packet DMA'ed into memory, inspect the first
byte, and then DMA'ed back out of memory.

Have fun,

Marc

 

[Chris Cheung]

The major advantages of using FPGA - You can have all your modules do processing in parallel. Such as digital filters. Microprocessor simply cannot do it.


"José da Rocha" &lt;jose_rocha@yahoo.com&gt; wrote in message news:ee84240.-1@WebX.sUN8CHnE...
Hello.
I'm new at the FPGA world. I understand that a FPGA and a microprocessor are NOT similar physical devices. (With a FPGA we can design our own digital functions)
I would like to know what are the main reasons to use a FPGA instead of a microprocessor in a real world application ?
Can anyone describe me some real world applications where the use of a FPGA is a more suitable solution than the use of a microprocessor and why?

Thank you very much for your answer

José da Rocha

 

[Rene Tschaggelar]

José da Rocha wrote:

Hello.
I’m new at the FPGA world. I understand that a FPGA and a microprocessor
are NOT similar physical devices. (With a FPGA we can design our own
digital functions)

I would like to know what are the main reasons to use a FPGA instead of
a microprocessor in a real world application ?
Can anyone describe me some real world applications where the use of a
FPGA is a more suitable solution than the use of a microprocessor and why?

There are functionalities that are better done in software and there
are others that are better done in hardware.

Point of interest may be the feasibility, power consumption, required
clock speed, ..

Though not generally true, the more trivial the functionality,
the simpler it is to be made in an FPGA. The more complex the
functionality, the better it is done with software.
As sidenote, there are microcontrollers available to be put into an
FPGA.

Rene
--
Ing.Buero R.Tschaggelar - http://www.ibrtses.com
&amp; commercial newsgroups - http://www.talkto.net

 

[Basuki Endah Priyanto]

A good reference :

http://www.andraka.com/dsp.htm


-----Original Message-----
From: Rene Tschaggelar [mailto:none@none.net]
Posted At: Wednesday, May 12, 2004 4:16 AM
Posted To: fpga
Conversation: FPGA vs Microprocessor: newbie question
Subject: Re: FPGA vs Microprocessor: newbie question


José da Rocha wrote:

Hello.
I'm new at the FPGA world. I understand that a FPGA and a
microprocessor are NOT similar physical devices. (With a FPGA we can
design our own digital functions)

I would like to know what are the main reasons to use a FPGA instead
of a microprocessor in a real world application ?
Can anyone describe me some real world applications where the use of a
FPGA is a more suitable solution than the use of a microprocessor and why?

There are functionalities that are better done in software and there are others that are better done in hardware.

Point of interest may be the feasibility, power consumption, required clock speed, ..

Though not generally true, the more trivial the functionality, the simpler it is to be made in an FPGA. The more complex the functionality, the better it is done with software.
As sidenote, there are microcontrollers available to be put into an FPGA.

Rene
--
Ing.Buero R.Tschaggelar - http://www.ibrtses.com &amp; commercial newsgroups - http://www.talkto.net