Product category:
Design and Development Software
News Release from: Aptix Corp | Subject: Prototype Studio
Edited by the Electronicstalk Editorial
Team on 21 November 2002
New options for pre-silicon FPGA
prototyping
Aptix Prototype Studio extends the benefits of Aptix proven prototyping technology to developers of custom multi-FPGA boards and incorporates support for Aptix traditional prototyping products.
Aptix Prototype Studio extends the benefits of Aptix proven prototyping technology to developers of custom multi-FPGA printed circuit boards (PCBs) and incorporates support for Aptix traditional prototyping products - System Explorer and Software Integration Station (SIS) It provides a complete RTL to pre-silicon prototype (PSP) flow, regardless of whether the target is a hardwired or reconfigurable PSP
This article was originally published on Electronicstalk on 10 Jan 2003 at 8.00am (UK)
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NEC Electronics America and Aptix Corp have developed a pre-silicon prototyping environment to support NEC Electronics' 32bit V850E1 embedded microcontroller core.
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"We are leaders in the SoC prototyping market, and our customers have asked us to extend our prototyping product line to include prototyping flows that give them powerful, cost effective, hardware target neutral options for their SoC prototypes, and help with the design of a SoC's hardware/software interface", remarked Charlie Miller, Sr VP of Marketing and Business Development at Aptix.
"With Aptix Prototype Studio, our customers can use a common prototyping flow and database for both our reconfigurable platforms and custom hardwired multi-FPGA printed circuit boards".
Miller added, "We also changed our pricing model to allow multidiscipline design teams to use our Software Integration Station's reconfigurable prototyping platforms on a time-based, term pricing basis.
Further reading
System demonstrates multimedia verification
This week at DATE03 in Munich Aptix Corp is demonstrating the ARM926EJ-S microprocessor core PrimeXsys platform on an Aptix Software Integration Station, running multimedia applications.
Platform FPGAs power flexible prototyping modules
Aptix has a new range of flexible prototyping modules based on Xilinx XC2V8000 Virtex-II Platform FPGAs for use with its System Explorer and Software Integration Station systems.
Pre-silicon prototyping supports ARM development
Aptix has joined the ARM Electronic Design Automation (EDA) Partnership Programme.
Our customers now have the advantage of 'instant' prototypes at about the same price as a custom hardwired PCB".
Aptix Prototype Studio, which includes Aptix Design Pilot, supports partitioning a monolithic SoC design across multiple FPGA devices, working within the pin constraints of the FPGAs, mapping SoC constructs like gated clocks into structures more appropriate for FPGAs, and debugging with the PSP when problems are uncovered in the design.
Aptix Prototype Studio supports the latest, state-of-the-art FPGA devices from Xilinx.
Ivo Bolsens, CTO at Xilinx, said, "Aptix' RTL to PCB flow offers state-of-the-art automation with outstanding quality-of-results (QoR) with its built-in Xilinx technology.
We are pleased that Aptix has found Xilinx Virtex II FPGAs to offer the best solution for its customers' multi-FPGA prototyping needs".
"We used Aptix Design Pilot software to quickly map our network gateway SoC design into FPGA technology for a pre-silicon prototype that helped us achieve first-pass success with our last chip", said Eric Lee, Vice President, IC technology, at Silicon Data.
"We are using Aptix Prototype Studio in our current project to help design and produce a quantity of custom FPGA-based printed circuit boards so we can deliver early pre-silicon prototypes to our software development team".
Aptix Prototype Studio is available in three forms.
Aptix Prototype Studio/PCB is available to designers targeting only hardwired PCBs.
Aptix Prototype Studio/Pro supports Aptix traditional reconfigurable prototyping products - System Explorer and Software Integration Station.
Aptix Prototype Studio/Enterprise supports all hardware targets.
The link from the Aptix prototype database to a hardwired PCB uses FPGA Connector from Translogic (Ede, The Netherlands).
This link includes the automatic creation of homogeneous and heterogeneous symbols necessary to interface to industry standard schematic editors, which reduces the tedious setup requirements for symbol creation into a mere matter of minutes.
The link converts HDL descriptions into pin constraints for FPGAs and includes version management to ensure database consistency and accuracy.
This use model promotes parallel engineering efficiency for schematic entry, FPGA place-and-route and board layout.
With an up-to-date FPGA library, Tcl scripting for design iterations, and extensive export formats for maximum schematic interface flexibility, Aptix now provides a complete RTL to CAD-ready mapping flow.
"FPGA Connector incorporates our accumulated knowledge of FPGA to board development in an easy-to-use software program.
FPGA Connector solves the real-world problems encountered by developers who target hardwired printed circuit boards.
We are pleased that Aptix will incorporate our product in Aptix Prototype Studio.
FPGA Connector offers a unique process of moving through the design flow, from the top-level HDL description to the PCB level symbol, as well as to the physical pin information, necessary for the FPGA place-and-route tools", said Tom Hassink, Director of Sales, Translogic.
Aptix Prototype Studio/PCB is provided as a time-based software license.
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