FPGA Gurus

The topic today is Australian development-tool specialist Altium Ltd., but the ongoing theme leverages off Monday’s observation on the new Lattice ECP3. I pondered at the end of the post whether faster I/O and better memory would shift the attention of designers to the competitive space of Spartan/Cyclone/ECP3, particularly with the cost constraints designers are living under in 2009.

Along comes Altium with new support for the Altera Cyclone III in NanoBoard, a desktop tool with plug-in daughter card that allows developers to characterize designs in a particular FPGA architecture and compare performance across designs. Yes, the company works with Virtex and Stratix as well, but the focus is clearly on the cost-effective FPGA options in smaller packages. With the new class of mid-range FPGAs adding faster serial interfaces and better core support for baseband functions, we should expect more development tools in 2009 to aim for this space. In fact, we might begin to wonder if Virtex-6 and Stratix-IV designs are pushed out for a couple years, due to the obsessive concern in a year like this one with keeping costs to a minimum. Stay tuned.