Articles – Page 269

Embedded Signal Processing Capabilities of the LatticeECP3 sysDSP Block

April 5, 2011

Field programmable devices are continually being adopted in new market segments, where they are being implemented as mainstream logic devices. These new market segments are increasingly driving competing FPGA vendors to incorporate a wider variety of functionality and flexibility within their devices. Embedded digital signal processing (DSP) is one such function, addressing a wide gamut of market segments. In order to meet increasing market demands, these processing elements and their supporting hardware platforms must be able to provide increased calculation throughput without the expense of additional latency. … Read More → "Embedded Signal Processing Capabilities of the LatticeECP3 sysDSP Block"

LatticeECP3 Family

by Bryon Moyer

April 5, 2011

The LatticeECP3™ (EConomy Plus Third generation) family of FPGA devices is optimized to deliver high performance features such as an enhanced DSP architecture, high speed SERDES and high speed source synchronous interfaces in an economical FPGA fabric. This combination is achieved through advances in device architecture and the use of 65nm technology making the devices suitable for high-volume, high-speed, low-cost applications.

The LatticeECP3 device family expands look-up-table (LUT) capacity to 149K logic elements and supports up to 586 user I/ … Read More → "LatticeECP3 Family"

Designing for Low Power

by Bryon Moyer

April 5, 2011

Power consumption is becoming an increasingly important variable when it comes to calculating OPEX and carbon footprint for telecom infrastructure projects. For example, on average, each fully loaded 3G cell site costs approximately $1600/yr US or $3200/yr in Europe. This suggests a typical European operator running 20000 cell sites would consume 58MW, which translates to about $62M USD per year. In addition to these costs, the level of consumption per cell site leads to an estimated 11 tons of carbon dioxide emissions per cell site per year. For these … Read More → "Designing for Low Power"

Reliable Reset Generation for TI DSP Processors

by Bryon Moyer

April 5, 2011

Modern fabrication technologies facilitate the acceleration of processor throughput by enabling the integration of board-level functions, such as SERDES interface, memory interface and multiple types of processors, on a single chip. One of the direct results of fine transistor geometries is lower core power supply voltages, such as 1.2V. However, peripherals require their own power supply levels, depending on the communication interface type. As a result, multiple supply voltages are required to power these devices. Texas Instruments’ fixed and floating point DSPs, like the TMS320C6 … Read More → "Reliable Reset Generation for TI DSP Processors"

Implementing Video Display Interfaces Using MachXO2 PLDs

by Bryon Moyer

April 5, 2011

Lattice Semiconductor has developed and supported a number of reference designs for display interfaces in various devices. A display interface is now available in the MachXO2 PLD family. Because this interface is now supported in MachXO2 devices, designers have an even lower cost and very low power alternative to implement embedded displays. As described in this white paper, the MachXO2 provides a compelling choice for this application.

HDR-60 Overview

by Bryon Moyer

April 5, 2011

The Lattice HDR-60 Video Camera Development Kit is a production-ready High Definition (HD) video camera development system based on the LatticeECP3™ FPGA family. Pre-loaded with a plug-and-play evaluation Image Signal Processing (ISP) pipeline based on Intellectual Property (IP) cores from Lattice partner Helion GmbH, the kit works right out of the box. The IP is capable of delivering 1080p performance at 60 frames per second with 2D noise reduction and High … Read More → "HDR-60 Overview"

Power Manager Pickle Power

by Bryon Moyer

April 5, 2011

Power Manager II value integrates hot swap controller, sequencing and monitoring at 50% of the cost.

This video is on the lighter side of Lattice. The Power Manager II family of devices integrates common, and some not-so-common, board power management functions into a single chip at half the cost.

… Read More →

Power 2 You: A Guide to Power Supply and Management Control

by Bryon Moyer

April 5, 2011

This free eBook provides technical details and design considerations for implementing the common circuit board power management functions. This book also provides generalized cost effective solutions for each of these functions that can be customized to meet a circuit board’s specific voltage, current and control environment.

Every circuit board is powered from one or more sources called the input, or primary, power supplies. And, every circuit board performs one or more … Read More → "Power 2 You: A Guide to Power Supply and Management Control"

An Exquisite Listening Experience

The Outer Edge of Real-time Audio and Environment Processing

by Bryon Moyer

March 31, 2011

A few weeks ago we explored the world of digital audio, and audio IP in particular. Today’s technology is making possible the kinds of improvements in sound quality that are starting to rival what was possible with vinyl, even as we sacrifice quality on the low end for the sake of putting even more crappy music on our phones.

But researching that story gave me a glimpse of what’s going on at the truly leading edge. It was way too … Read More → "An Exquisite Listening Experience"

A New Cut at DRC

Polyteda Resets Run-Times

by Bryon Moyer

March 31, 2011

DRC sometimes feels like one of those sleepy, familiar technologies that’s been around forever and isn’t going to surprise you. Well, I don’t know if something’s in the water, but over the last few weeks there’s been a flurry of DRC-related activity. While some of the news involves well-known names in the biz (the best-known name being Mentor, with their overwhelmingly dominant Calibre tool), a newcomer is trying to redefine the space a bit.

The company is Polyteda, and they’ve developed a different approach to … Read More → "A New Cut at DRC"