Low-cost entry into embedded system design

[iaresee]

Disclaimer: I work for Altera

But still, that doesn't stop this being hella cool for DIY. For $49 you get an entire embedded system design environment on a "USB key" type device. A Cyclone III processor, Quartus II the NIOS embedded processor -- everything! That's crazy cheap.

If you've having trouble with Arduino-ese or writing in assembler, using an embedded NIOS processor lets you write in plain old C, but hardware accelerate your code in sections using the very slick NIOS developer GUI. Got a long loop that you run all the time? Select, click, unroll it into dedicated hardware in the FPGA. Done. Nothing else for you to worry about. The NIOS dev environment takes care of building up the HDL and the interface your C code needs.

There's a 80-pin edge connector for I/O. The Cyclone III has some fairly powerful DSP blocks built in to it (these chips are used a lot in TVs to do 3:1 pulldown processing on video, audio standard translation, etc.). This could be a very viable DIY platform.

Very freaking cool.

http://www.altera.com/b/nios-bemicro-evaluation-kit.html?contactID=104044888&gwkey=L3MYSY3QBY

[tommy.genes]

I wanted to give this a bump because I think it is very exciting, but I don't even know enough to discuss it yet. 

I noticed they are offering the $39 workshop, which includes the eval board, in Europe and Asia only. Any word on a similar deal in the US?

Thx,
-- T. G. --

[iaresee]

I asked the Arrow rep if there will be similar workshops in NA next year.

[ExpAnonColin]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but where's the mac platform?!?!  This looks really cool, but no Mac development software is ultra bogus.

-Colin

[iaresee]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but where's the mac platform?!?!  This looks really cool, but no Mac development software is ultra bogus.

Colin, you're not wrong. Altera only produces Linux and Windows compatible versions of their CAD tools. Sorry man. It's a money-talks type decision. The number of FPGA designers on Mac is...well, nil.

And as a follow-up to the seminar question: they had NA events in the fall. But email your local Arrow rep and tell them you're interested because they're considering a February second run if there's enough interest.

[ExpAnonColin]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but where's the mac platform?!?!  This looks really cool, but no Mac development software is ultra bogus.

Colin, you're not wrong. Altera only produces Linux and Windows compatible versions of their CAD tools. Sorry man. It's a money-talks type decision. The number of FPGA designers on Mac is...well, nil.

And as a follow-up to the seminar question: they had NA events in the fall. But email your local Arrow rep and tell them you're interested because they're considering a February second run if there's enough interest.

Hey!  Count me as one!!!  Guess I will have to see if it will run in VMware.

-Colin

[iaresee]

Hey!  Count me as one!!!  Guess I will have to see if it will run in VMware.

Interesting. What FPGA CAD tools are you running on Mac now? Of Altera and Xilinx, neither of them have place and route engines that work on Mac.

Altera's tools run very well in VM Ware. I've run them at home on my personal Mac that way for about a year now, no problems. The ByteBlasters are found in the VM and everything.

[ExpAnonColin]

Hey!  Count me as one!!!  Guess I will have to see if it will run in VMware.

Interesting. What FPGA CAD tools are you running on Mac now? Of Altera and Xilinx, neither of them have place and route engines that work on Mac.

Altera's tools run very well in VM Ware. I've run them at home on my personal Mac that way for about a year now, no problems. The ByteBlasters are found in the VM and everything.

I'm running those in VMware too.  Good to know the Altera stuff will run.

-Colin

[iaresee]

I'm running those in VMware too.  Good to know the Altera stuff will run.

Yes. We test with VM Ware and Xen VMs. RHEL and Windows XP.