Low power consumption board with memory

[Duccio]

Hi, I'm an italian student of Automation Engineering (..sorry for my
academic english...).
It's the first time that I post in this group. I would like to know if
there is some fpga board (I've just used an Altera board for an exam of


Electronic Digital Systems) that has this requirements:
-low power consuption (for using with a solar panel), less than 100mA
of current consumption at 3.3-1.2 V;
-a non-volatile memory (eeprom...) that contains the "programs" also
when it's extinguished;
-a max cost of about 200 $.


I thank all of you that can answer to me.


Bye
Duccio

 

[linnix]

Hi, I'm an italian student of Automation Engineering (..sorry for my
academic english...).
It's the first time that I post in this group. I would like to know if
there is some fpga board (I've just used an Altera board for an exam of


Electronic Digital Systems) that has this requirements:
-low power consuption (for using with a solar panel), less than 100mA
of current consumption at 3.3-1.2 V;

How many gates? A 200K Xilinx draws 80mA typical.

-a non-volatile memory (eeprom...) that contains the "programs" also
when it's extinguished;

Usually an external chip.

-a max cost of about 200 $.

Not a problem.

 

[[email protected]]

Hi, I'm an italian student of Automation Engineering (..sorry for my
academic english...).
It's the first time that I post in this group. I would like to know if
there is some fpga board (I've just used an Altera board for an exam of


Electronic Digital Systems) that has this requirements:
-low power consuption (for using with a solar panel), less than 100mA
of current consumption at 3.3-1.2 V;
-a non-volatile memory (eeprom...) that contains the "programs" also
when it's extinguished;
-a max cost of about 200 $.

Have a look at the Xilinx CoolRunner II range

http://www.xilinx.com/products/sili...unner_series/coolrunner_ii_cplds/overview.htm

which seems to be more or less what you want.

 

[Steve Burke]

I've used boards from www.easyfpga.com for small jobs. Good support, USB
loadable. Some have EEPROM. Available in both Xilinx and Altera varieties.

Steve

 

[[email protected]]

-low power consuption (for using with a solar panel), less than 100mA
of current consumption at 3.3-1.2 V;

In CMOS devices a major determining factor of power consumption is
clock speed, because switching consumers far, far more power than
holding state. You want to keep the clock speed as low as you possibly
can and still complete your application in the available time. Many
microcontrollers designed for battery operation have features to slow
or even stop the clock to most of the chip when computational demand is
light, you may want to implement something similar in your FPGA design.

I know this is an FPGA newsgroup, but do you actually need an FPGA, or
would a simple microcontroller accomplish your task?

Also you may want to consider if your instantaneous power budget can be
higher than your time average power budget - if you have a battery in
the system or potentially even a very large capacitor, you might be
able to draw higher current for a few milliseconds, then "sleep" for a
second drawing almost no power at all, for a low very low average power
consumption.

 

[[email protected]]

I know this is an FPGA newsgroup, but do you actually need an FPGA, or
would a simple microcontroller accomplish your task?

I mean I thought it was comp.arch.fpga, but now see that it isn't. All
the more justification for asking if an FPGA is necessary, or if a
little micro can do them job.

FPGA's are wonderful devices, and FPGA's with soft-core processors or
paired with external processors give you all sorts of choices between
hardware and software solutions - they are great for experiments. But
for many products that don't need the unique advantages of dedicated
hardware, they may not be the right choice. Consider you can just
connect many small micros to a battery, download code and go - FPGAs
tend to need a PCB, power supply sequencing, etc - because they are
complicated devices and tend to find use only in applications that are
either high end, already complicated, or where the point is to preserve
options - in practice this means very expensive limited volume systems,
prototypes, learning kits, and consumer products where subassemblies
may change specification frequently, such as some flat panel TV's.

 

[Duccio]

Thanks to all for your help.
The most important requirement of the board is that it must have a
non-volatile memory so
I can power-off it on the night (when there isn't thr sun that recharge
the battery via solar panel),
thus I'm oriented to the a CPLD board (as Altera MAX II, have everyone
use this board?).

Bye