Xilinx Simplifies Memory Interface Designs with New Complete FPGA Solutions
(Interviews, 08 Jun 2007 )
Xilinx Inc. has announced the availability of its low cost Spartan-3A FPGA development kit for DDR2 SDRAM interfaces, the Virtex-5 FPGA development platform (ML-561) for multiple high-performance memory interfaces (I/Fs), and the memory interface generator (MIG) software version 1.7. These complete solutions enable FPGA users to quickly implement and verify custom memory interface designs across various data rates and bus widths thus accelerating time-to-market.
The solutions, including device characterization, data capture circuitry, and memory controller, are all fully verified in hardware using memory devices from industry leaders such as Micron Technology.
"Micron and Xilinx have a common objective to provide and validate complete memory solutions for a spectrum of applications from lowest cost to highest-performance," said Jim Cooke, director of applications engineering for Micron's memory group. "We have been working together for many years to ensure our memory devices work seamlessly with Xilinx FPGAs. Our latest DDR2 SDRAMs with Spartan-3 generation and Virtex-5 FPGAs, provide customers with flexible choices to meet low-cost and high-performance system requirements."
Xilinx memory interface solutions are developed using production-qualified 90nm Spartan-3A and 65nm Virtex-5 FPGAs, supporting up to twice the bus-width of any other FPGA based solution shipping today. Low cost memory interfaces can be built rapidly with the I/O optimized Spartan-3A FPGA family while Virtex-5 FPGAs with built-in 75 ps calibration circuits, flexible I/Os to connect memory on any side of the FPGA, and innovative packaging to minimize crosstalk for reliable operation of wide memory interfaces offer the highest bandwidth.
"Memory interfaces and FPGAs have become ubiquitous across all industries from low cost consumer products to high end communication systems. Performance requirements span from 200Mbps to over 600Mbps with bus widths wider than 144 bits,” said Jag Bolaria, senior analyst at The Linley Group. "Xilinx broad FPGA offerings and memory interface solutions enable designers to develop systems with confidence in a much shorter time."
