Inkjet print head FPGA Development Board for the RASPBERRY PI

Question

Dear All,

I am looking alternative FPGA's and easy modifications for print head drive electronics. is it possible for Raspberry pi.

I am not software guy. but would like to learn.

Can anyone help me, form where i must start. ( VHDL? )

Thanks,

Ronald

michaelkellett · Answer

The first question that springs to mind is what kind of print head and what kind of printer do you want to make. With that information you can start to work out what kind of FPGA you need. Then you can sort out how to start development. If you have not done any FPGA work before I suggest you start learning on something a bit simpler.

You can buy little Altera dev kits for Amazon or Aliexpress for less than £25 for everything and use free tools off the web.

ALTERA FPGA CycloneII EP2C5T144 Mini Development Board Minimum System Board for Learning -

on Amazon Uk for £14.99 and you'll need a programmer like:

WYPH Mini USB Blaster ALTERA Cable for CPLD FPGA NIOS JTAG Altera Programmer

for an additional £4.99

people sell bundles as well.

Or you could spend $99 on a Digilent ARTY and get a whizzo Xilinx Artix up to date FPGA but if you are just starting I don't think it's any more use and sadder if you blow it up.

You can learn VHDL (or Verilog if you must) at home but consider getting some initial training (some of the 1 week commercial introductory courses are quite good but not cheap) if you can.

MK