Re: New project...PCI based servo control board

[John Sheahan <jrsheahan-at-optushome.com.au>]

On Fri, Mar 28, 2003 at 09:50:09PM -0500, Craig Edwards wrote:
> 
> I agree with the comments on choice of FPGAs...and yes, I'm pretty sure
> we'll have to use 3.3V (really no reason not to that I'm aware of).

Agree if you want one or 2, most things are available for far longer. 
I usually design things that use new purchasable components. BUT 


I'd wonder about this. 3.3V is also obselete and is likely to
disappear a lot faster than 5V, since it was around for a much shorter
time.

current fpga's like spartan II or virtex II are 2.5 or 1.8 or 1.5 or
1.?  on the core.   IO supply is decoupled and often can be more.

If you want a flash cpld, then something like the coolrunnerII is
reasonable and relatively cheap, at least at the 256 macrocell level

If you need something bigger,  then a spartan II is a reasonable choice.
Sram based is where you want to be if the register count is significant.

I think you have about zero chance of fitting a PCI interface in anything 
flash based. Last one I worked with was 10 or 20K gates from memory. 

Any of the Altera equivilants are also good.
 
Consider also schematic packages and their odd file formats tend to go
obselete much faster than ascii verilog/VHDL source fiiles.

john