Prototyping kit shortens embedded schedules

To cope with constantly shrinking design schedules and to simplify the inevitable product updates a growing number of embedded systems designers are incorporating reconfigurable FPGA technology. Lending support to this trend, Altera just announced the Embedded Systems Development Kit, Cyclone III FPGA Edition, a complete platform to simplify the prototyping and development of FPGA-based embedded systems. This three-board development kit features a Cyclone III EP3C120 FPGA device with memories, I/O interfaces, and peripherals. The kit also contains a selection of pre-built processor systems, intellectual property (IP), operating systems and software applications. Users create their FPGA-based embedded system by selecting from a multitude of on-board example processor systems, demonstration designs, and reference designs. With the recent release of Wind River Linux support for Altera’s Nios II soft processor, designers can use this hardware platform as a basis for developing embedded Linux designs. The kit is comprised of a Cyclone III FPGA development board with two high-speed mezzanine connectors (HSMCs), an LCD multimedia HSMC board, and a multipurpose HSMC card. The development board features an EP3C120F780 FPGA, 256 Mbytes of dual-channel DDR2 SDRAM with ECC, 8 Mbytes of pseudo SRAM, 64 Mbytes of flash and a 10/100/1000 Ethernet communication port. The development kit includes Altera’s complete design suite DVD featuring the Quartus II Web Edition design software, ModelSim-Altera Starter Edition, the Nios II embedded design suite and Altera’s MegaCore IP library.  The Embedded Systems Development Kit, Cyclone III FPGA Edition is available now through Altera’s online store and is priced at $1,995.