Orchid XP v8 wrote:
> Heh. Chris Cason. Is there anything he can't do? ;-)

Get betas out on time?

> I've been to the Xilinx website and looked at the various "development 
> boards" they offer, and most of them seem to be around $2,000. Obviously 
> I don't have that kind of money. I'll have to hunt around further to see 
> if they offer anything at more sane prices.

Hmmm, thought they had some cheap ones. Check out Altera. I seem to recall
they have some small, cheapish (around the $100-$200 mark) boards.

Also, keep an eye out for a CPLD devkit. CPLD's are (simply put) FPGA's
with persistent configuration; i.e. you don't need to re-program them each
time they are powered up.

> Also, if memory serves me correctly, the Xilinx software is a free 
> download; they make their money from selling you the hardware. Maybe I 

Like Altera they probably have an advanced version of the software that
costs $$$. Back about ten years ago, even the base software version cost
$1000 or so, but then they woke up to the fact that they are a hardware
company and would probably sell more FPGA's if they didn't put barriers in
the way of people designing with them. (This may seem obvious, but to bean
counters, it apparently isn't: e.g. take the fact that Microsoft used to
charge a few grand for the Windows 1.0 and 2.0 SDK's before realising
they'd have more users if it was free).

-- Chris

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