RE: [oc] FPGA/ASIC Design Kits

["Paul McFeeters" <paul.mcfeeters@ntlworld.com>]

Jim,

 

if you can afford them the pukka ('genuine' to non-UK readers) Xilinx and Altera boards are probably good.

When I was buying I couldn't afford the cheapest Xilinx board (minus the FPGA itself is 3x the cost of the

boards I use at the moment) and considering Xilinx makes them both you think they could bundle them?

Also the Xilinx boards are for Virtex and Virtex-E devices not the Spartan II and II-E which I would expect

are the defacto 'intro to FPGA programming chips'. I wouldn't suggest any 'newbies' spending more than

$200 (USD) on a development board before they find out whether they actually like hardware programming.

A FPGA board is for life not just for Christmas. ;-)

 

I have no experience with the Alteras yet so can't comment on them but funds permitting will be buying

Xilinx, Xess and Altera boards next year.

 

Paul

-----Original Message-----
From: owner-cores@opencores.org [mailto:owner-cores@opencores.org]On Behalf Of Jim Dempsey
Sent: 12 December 2001 15:19
To: cores@opencores.org
Subject: Re: [oc] FPGA/ASIC Design Kits

Look at the developer's kit from Altera.

The Altera Excalibur NIOS Kit has just about everyting you need to get started for under $1000.

Xilinx is another place to look for developer kits.

 

P.S. I am inexperienced at this myself. But I am looking around myself. These were the two

vendors that seem to me to have the best products (for my requiements).

 

Some of the other old hatters here might have better advice.

I am an old-timmer looking for a new hat.

 

 

Jim Dempsey

 

----- Original Message -----

From: Mohammed El Shoukry

To: cores@opencores.org

Sent: Tuesday, December 11, 2001 2:07 PM

Subject: [oc] FPGA/ASIC Design Kits

Sorry Guys I'm new to this but I want to get on track as fast as possible.

what kind of Kits would you use for trying and testing your designs for ASIC or FPGA, ofcourse you don't go to the foundry for each new idea ?

Paul ?