Any suggestions of starter FPGA projects for someone who is a programmer but wants to get into FPGAs?
http://www.fpga4fun.com has some nice projects for starting out with FPGAs.
Lattice's $24.99 FPGA Evaluation Kit
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Re: Lattice's $24.99 FPGA Evaluation Kit
#32Earlier quoted context omitted.
Windows is par for the course. If you want to develop for FPGAs, I suggest you accept Windows, at least to start with. Xilinx can run on Linux and all that, but Windows is the path of least resistance, and FPGAs will give you enough trouble by themselves!
I've been doing digital design for Xilinx FPGAs, as well as IC design, for a few years now and never had any trouble with the Linux toolchain. I can't even imagine switching to Windows and trying to automate the build (not saying it's not possible, it just seems a lot more convoluted). It's true that smaller vendors like Lattice seldom provide Linux software, but it's also rare to find bigger shops (as opposed to hob…
You absolutely can use Linux. I just recall from my FPGA days, Windows was the easiest way to get going for hobbyist FPGA work. If running Linux is what matters to you, run Linux. If developing for an FPGA is what matters to you, do what is easiest to get you there, IMO.
I don't care what people use, but this community tends to get lost in, 'well it's got to be open source...' and whole productive lines of inquiry get totally derailed.
Re: Lattice's $24.99 FPGA Evaluation Kit
#33I'm interested in doing some audio work on fpga. At a minimum this requires a decent dac/adc. Can anyone recommend a cheap board that provides this onboard? Seems most kits with audio also contain video and got for around $400 AUD
Unfortunately "decent" is vague with dacs and adcs because there's at least 3 figures of merit usually you only get to max out 1 at a time. Assuming your app needs to max out any of them. So if you want 24 bit input with a low noise floor good luck getting above "KHz" sampling ranges yet if you want 500 megasamples/sec you're looking at like 8 bits. Or if you want on board signal processing (differential inputs, maybe a built in multiplier, or 8 input mux on the input so you can read 8 things) you'll "pay" for that one way or another.
The good news is this board has a pmod connector and go to digilent and search for pmods and there's some great COTS plug and play A/D and D/A. The bad news is there's... one pmod connector. That really sucks as the amount of fun you can have scales with about the cube or so of the number of peripheral devices connected. If only this "stick" had two pmod connectors. My go-to screwing around board is a mere $90 basys2 and its got 4 pmod connectors and a ton of onboard stuff. So I'm paying an extra $65 to basically not have a headache and have a ton of fun. I can deal with that.
If you're willing to not go plug and play just get one of the breadboard to pmod adapter thingies and the RCA breakout and stick like two 8-pin DIP chips on, a D/A and a A/D and call it good.
You have to decide if you're trying to minimize spend, or minimize effort (plug and play) and WRT effort are you more into hardware or software.
One advantage not discussed about onboard peripherals is they work and are easily tested. There's always a certain distrust, did I blow that chip, can that GD thing actually successfully do I2C at all, etc. Well, if you've got a lot of onboard stuff, just load up the demo / test program if you're feeling worried... Also much as software programmers do a lot with extra added "print" statements for debugging, you'd be surprised what a FPGA dev can do with a bunch of onboard switches and LEDs.
Re: Lattice's $24.99 FPGA Evaluation Kit
#34Specs: • 1280 Four input LUT logic cells • 64Kbit of RAM • 32Mbit flash • a PLL • Two sets of 8 digital I/O pins • One Pmod connector (2x6 0.10" socket, some sort of digital interface) • 5 LEDs • An IrDA transceiver • USB dongle form factor, programmed from USB, can look like a UART from FPGA to PC The design software appears to only function on the Windows operating system.
If you added a small uC to that (such as a Microchip PIC), it would be a killer dev board. I'd happily connectorize it, develop my hardware and simply plug the development board into the target system!
Re: Lattice's $24.99 FPGA Evaluation Kit
#35I actually have one of these on my desk. The chain is a bit of a task to install. The licencing is kind of weird on it. The chain it self isn't bad to work with. I just with they would give more resources and tutorials for it. They give you a blinking LED example and send you off on your way...