Starting with FPGA


Nishant Sood

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I have spent a very good healthy time developing professional project's with AVR 8 bit processor and mainly Arduino and Netduino (A 32 BIT powerful ARM processor on it!), Now I want to get into FPGA development.

Can you experienced guys can guide me to have some good introduction of FPGA's and their difference from our standard embedded domain?

Also, what are the benefit's of getting proficient in it?(leaving JOB prospect's)

and ,Most prominently where to start? (I know papilio is great! one to start with but any other BOOK or step by step guide that will make me proficient in these systems?)

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I was new do this (I still am), and got myself a Papilio.

The difference? In standard embedded, you *buy* logic, in FPGA you *design* logic.

Wish your AVR chip had 48 PWM channels? With an FPGA, you can create an AVR core linked to 48 PWM channels!

Everything I learned, was from searches on the net.

There's some good material out there... you'll find great stuff on EDU domain sites (looks crappy - 1990s web - but the content is very good).

Unfortunately, I can't remember any off the top of my head - Google is your friend.

The material at http://hamsterworks.co.nz/mediawiki/index.php/FPGA_course is a pretty good launch point.

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Nishant,

Mike Fields has written a great book that uses the Papilio and the LogicStart MegaWing to get you started with VHDL.

The github page is here, and the direct pdf dowload is here.

I just received the first batch of LogicStart MegaWings and am currently verifying them, they will probably be available in the store within a week!

Jack.

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I just received the first batch of LogicStart MegaWings and am currently verifying them, they will probably be available in the store within a week!

How does the spec looks like for this version?, I found references to using lcd, 7segment leds, various placement of pins etc.

Will it come with stackable headers?, so one can have female headers on top like the papilio, or will it not be usable to add wings on top?

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Part of getting these boards up for sale is to finish a wiki page that gives in depth info on these boards, Dhia and I will be working on that today and tomorrow probably.

The final version has:

  • 7 Segment display
  • Micro-Joystick
  • 3r-3g-2b VGA Output
  • 8 Slide Switches
  • 8 LED's
  • Mono Audio Output
  • 7 channel 12-bit ADC

We squeezed in as much into this board as possible so there is no expansion possible, every single pin is used. It does plug into the Papilio One so you can of course swap out the board with other Wings or MegaWings.

Jack.

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Excellent, I'm shipping out your order now. We are almost done with the Wiki Page and will start working on a showcase category with some examples for the board. Alvie is working on an awesome Arakanoid demo using ZPUino and his new Spectrum ZX compatible VGA controller, the best part is that the demo uses a pot for the controller. :)

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If this is your one experimental board... I'd suggest the 500K.

For most beginner "production" purposes, the 250K would be fine. But if you're wanting to experiment and learn... the 500K will allow you to try things that the 250K couldn't hold.

To replace an Arduino Plant Watering System - 250K

To learn and experiment with - 500K

Get the 500K

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  • 1 year later...

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