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Forum Is there an FPGA that you don't need a computer engineering degree just to get a light to blink?
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Is there an FPGA that you don't need a computer engineering degree just to get a light to blink?

Former Member
Former Member over 9 years ago

I have an Altera CPLD, Altera DE0-Nano-SoC, and a xilinx mojo v3.

the CPLD is the only I could get working with a lot of stupid usb drive hoops to jump through.

 

Does anyone make a board with good documentation on installation and troubleshooting.

I feel like Altera and Xilinx don't care about the maker community but want our money without putting any effort out on there part.

 

David

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Top Replies

  • shabaz
    shabaz over 9 years ago +2
    Hi David, Which area are you specifically concerned about, the development software (toolchain), or the software that will push the final synthesized design into the board? Regardless of the board, you…
  • Former Member
    Former Member over 9 years ago in reply to Jan Cumps +2
    I am trying to build a computer from first principals, a hardware version of NAND2Tetris The Elements of Computing Systems / Nisan & Schocken
  • Jan Cumps
    Jan Cumps over 9 years ago in reply to Jan Cumps +2
    I've filmed my first endeavours - warning: I had no knowledge at all when filming this, so it's really from a starters point of view. Only the last video is an own design (with most code blatantly stolen…
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  • johnbeetem
    johnbeetem over 9 years ago

    I haven't used the Mojo V3 board myself.  Its maker Embedded Micro has tutorials and a forum.  I'd recommend trying the tutorials and checking the forum if you get stuck.

     

    Unfortunately, there's a steep learning curve with all the FPGAs if you're using vendor tools.  With each release the curve gets worse.  If you've been designing with a vendor's parts for a long time, you don't really notice it that much since each release only makes incremental changes.  However, if you're just starting out you're trying to drink from a firehose and it's pretty brutal.  See the discussion: Barriers to designing with FPGAs?

     

    Altera and Xilinx are interesting in selling you huge quantities of reasonably-priced chips or medium quantities of very expensive chips.  If you're just a maker they're not going to give you individual help, though you can get useful information from the Xilinx community forum.  So your best bet is the tutorials and forum of whoever makes your board.

     

    I like Gadget Factory and their Papilio boards.  They have a very helpful forum.  However, you're still going to have to install and learn to use Xilinx ISE.  Plus the Xilinx Spartan-6 on the Mojo and Papilio DUO is a very complex beast.  So you're liable to get strange error messages and warnings.

     

    I really like the Lattice iCE40 as a simple chip for new users.  This is the only FPGA I know of that has open-source design tools (IceStorm).  They are quite simple to use, but a bit of a pain to install.  I use them on Ubuntu GNU/Linux.  I don't know whether they've been installed successfully on Windows.  People who care about open-source software usually have a GNU/Linux machine handy.

     

    I've backed a nice iCE40 board called Nandland Go Board which is designed for new users.  Its creator's site has some nice tutorials.  I expect to get my board by the end of March 2016.

     

    If you stick with it, FPGAs can do amazing things that you simply cannot do with a CPU.  Here's my "elevator speech" on why someone would want to learn FPGAs:

    Have you ever wanted a custom digital chip for a project, but didn't have $1 million lying around to pay for fabricating it?   Well, an FPGA lets you do it for tens of dollars.

    Hope this helps!

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  • Former Member
    Former Member over 9 years ago in reply to johnbeetem

    It is The "They are quite simple to use, but a bit of a pain to install." I have an issue and where I call out both Altera and Xilinx for not supporting the community because It is left to the community to make videos like :https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wF9vlO-ah-A

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  • Former Member
    Former Member over 9 years ago in reply to Former Member

    The Pin assignments are  in the DE0-Nano-SoC_User_manual.pdf starting at page 26

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  • Former Member
    Former Member over 9 years ago in reply to Former Member

    The Pin assignments are  in the DE0-Nano-SoC_User_manual.pdf starting at page 26

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