Product category:
Design and Development Hardware
News Release from: Emulation and Verification Engineering (EVE) | Subject: ZeBu
Edited by the Electronicstalk Editorial
Team on 02 May 2003
Multiboard emulator scales up to bigger
challenges
A novel advanced, multiboard hardware verification system extends the capacity of designs from 1.5 million to 12 million ASIC-equivalent gates.
Emulation and Verification Engineering (EVE) has unveiled an advanced, multiboard hardware verification system that extends the capacity of designs from 1.5 million to 12 million ASIC-equivalent gates ZeBu - or zero bugs - is a hardware platform used to accelerate the verification process of field programmable gate array (FPGA)-based designs, as well as the software development cycle for embedded software designs
This article was originally published on Electronicstalk on 27 May 2003 at 8.00am (UK)
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Canon Information System Research of Australia has chosen the ZeBu verification platform to verify and debug a new line of ASICs.
"Zero-bugs" system turns to software development
ZeBu-IP is a companion version to EVE's powerful "zero bugs" hardware verification system designed to accelerate the development cycle for embedded software designs.
Newly developed and flexible networking technology from EVE enables up to eight ZeBu boards to be connected together to accommodate designs that range from one to 12 million ASIC-equivalent gates.
Installed on a designer's desktop, ZeBu offers the same debugging capabilities found in high-end emulation systems, but at a higher speed and at a fraction of their cost.
It enables designers to install multiple boards in multiple PCs and use them collectively on one large design or individually and concurrently on smaller designs.
Further reading
Integration speeds system-level verification
EVE has joined the Verisity Interoperability Partners programme and has integrated its ZeBu with Verisity's Specman Elite verification process automation solution.
Hardware/software integration speeds verification
The ZeBu from Emulation and Verification Engineering can now be integrated with key software technology from Synplicity to help accelerate the verification of SoC designs.
Integrated tool accelerates verification
ZAiQ's Systemware and EVE's ZeBu have been integrated to produce a transaction-based verification platform.
"We've been selling ZeBu for almost a year and have seen growing interest worldwide", remarks Luc Burgun, EVEs President and Chief Executive Officer.
"With the introduction of the multiboard ZeBu system, we expect widespread adoption of this affordable and comprehensive desktop emulation solution".
While software-based verification tools are inadequate for software testing and exhaustive hardware validation of today's designs, the high cost of ownership of traditional hardware emulators confines them to high-end applications and large designs.
The latest version of ZeBu can execute at a higher speed than traditional emulators, offering the same design debug environment at a lower cost.
Unlike traditional emulation systems based on a rigid hardware backplane, EVE has developed a new and flexible networking technology for emulation systems called Z-EmuNet.
This new capability enables up to eight ZeBu boards to be connected together to accommodate designs with up to 12 million ASIC-equivalent gates plus 1Gbit of memory to serve the vast majority of applications.
ZeBu's uniqueness is the ability to install multiple boards in multiple PCs and use them collectively on one large design or individually and concurrently on smaller designs.
The same Z-EmuNet technology makes it also possible to connect one or more Z-ICE Pods.
Z-ICE Pods, which sit outside a designer's PC, can be used to interface ZeBu to a target system to support in-circuit emulation.
They can also be used to encompass one or more hard macros - ARM, MIPS or PPC, for example - and emulate them in the context of the entire design mapped inside a ZeBu system.
"These advancements make ZeBu the perfect shareable emulation system", affirms Lauro Rizzatti, Vice President of Marketing at EVE.
"We've made it possible for a designer's desktop to be quickly and easily transformed into a complete emulation system".
ZeBu will be continuously demonstrated at the 40th Design Automation Conference (DAC) in Booth Number 2264 from Monday 2nd June to Wednesday 4th June, at the Anaheim Convention Centre.
ZeBu now scales up to 12-million gates, starting at $49,000 (US pricing) for one million ASIC-equivalent gates.
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