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Registered Member #2292
Joined: Fri Aug 14 2009, 05:33PM
Location: The Wild West AKA Arizona
Posts: 795
Hydron wrote ...
Mads Barnkob wrote ...
That is one beautiful board and feature rich for that sake!
But oh do I fear having to trouble shoot on a 4 layer board with a FPGA programmed in something I do not understand or have installed ;) There is a reason for me sticking with throughhole components.
While BGAs etc are a massive pain to debug or DIY, don't be afraid of the larger SMD parts. I find anything down to SOIC/0805 size _easier_ to deal with than throughhole, as there are no wires to bend, snip, drill holes for etc, and they take much less room. I've even had good results down to TSSOP/0603 size on home etched boards, though that requires more care and better eyes/magnifiers.
As for FPGAs, they are fantastic devices for certain applications. I'm lucky enough at work that our products are cost insensitive enough for us to be able to use them extensively, giving us a ton of flexibility to implement and change product functionality after the hardware design stage. Coding for them is also not too bad once you adjust to the different paradigm of parallel hardware vs sequential software operation, though there are many little pitfalls, especially with regards to signal timing. I highly recommend people having a play with them if they get the chance, though unfortunately they aren't readily available in hobbyist packages/dev kits as many microcontrollers are these days.
I agree, FPGAs, are not common in hobbies friendly packages. The only FPGA in the spartan 3 series that is in a non-BGA pack was to small (logic wise) to properly implement this design.
However if used properly they can still be very easy to debug. BGA is electrically superior to other large multi-pin SMD packages.
In honesty I think BGAs just seem difficult to most hobbyist who have not tried them. They are simple to solder with ether a hot air station or toaster over re-flow.
Registered Member #2292
Joined: Fri Aug 14 2009, 05:33PM
Location: The Wild West AKA Arizona
Posts: 795
Well, I have not had much time to work on it lately with finals creeping up. I did manage however to get a FIR (finite impulse response) filter implemented and working. The FIR is used to produce the phase leaded signal digitally inside of the FPGA.
FIR filters can mimic most hardware filter typologies. Mine is 4 tap and works using the built in hardware multipliers. I have tested the filter in both simulation and hardware and it works very well! Much easier to tune than the old hardware approach. A pot and ADC can be used or it can be set digital via a communications interface.
I will update more on this project when finals are finished and I get some time to work on it.
Registered Member #2292
Joined: Fri Aug 14 2009, 05:33PM
Location: The Wild West AKA Arizona
Posts: 795
Steve Conner wrote ...
Very cool! :D As I mentioned before, I am willing to buy one and contribute to development.
Sounds good Steve, do you have a way to solder BGA? If not I can solder the BGA on. I do however need to make a couple revisions to the board. Maybe after I finish finals up I will get back into the project some more. If you want to put up with some minor errors in the board and solder on your own BGA I have an extra board that I could send you to experiment with in the mean time.
I'm considering moving down to the QFN-100 package Spartan 3AN, because of the excessive amount of power this one has, it's not really necessary to have 200k gates for this type of controller.
Registered Member #3324
Joined: Sun Oct 17 2010, 06:57PM
Location:
Posts: 1276
Goodchild wrote ...
Steve Conner wrote ...
Very cool! :D As I mentioned before, I am willing to buy one and contribute to development.
Sounds good Steve, do you have a way to solder BGA? If not I can solder the BGA on. I do however need to make a couple revisions to the board. Maybe after I finish finals up I will get back into the project some more. If you want to put up with some minor errors in the board and solder on your own BGA I have an extra board that I could send you to experiment with in the mean time.
I'm considering moving down to the QFN-100 package Spartan 3AN, because of the excessive amount of power this one has, it's not really necessary to have 200k gates for this type of controller.
Registered Member #2292
Joined: Fri Aug 14 2009, 05:33PM
Location: The Wild West AKA Arizona
Posts: 795
Thomas W wrote ...
Goodchild wrote ...
Steve Conner wrote ...
Very cool! :D As I mentioned before, I am willing to buy one and contribute to development.
Sounds good Steve, do you have a way to solder BGA? If not I can solder the BGA on. I do however need to make a couple revisions to the board. Maybe after I finish finals up I will get back into the project some more. If you want to put up with some minor errors in the board and solder on your own BGA I have an extra board that I could send you to experiment with in the mean time.
I'm considering moving down to the QFN-100 package Spartan 3AN, because of the excessive amount of power this one has, it's not really necessary to have 200k gates for this type of controller.
How much cheaper would that be out of curiosity?
I only currently have one extra and Steve expressed interest in it first. I want to get the bugs worked out before I release a board to the public. As soon as I make the revision you guys are more than welcome to have a board to experiment with.
As I mentioned I want to switch it over to a QFN type package to aid with soldering.
Registered Member #3324
Joined: Sun Oct 17 2010, 06:57PM
Location:
Posts: 1276
Goodchild wrote ...
Thomas W wrote ...
Goodchild wrote ...
Steve Conner wrote ...
Very cool! :D As I mentioned before, I am willing to buy one and contribute to development.
Sounds good Steve, do you have a way to solder BGA? If not I can solder the BGA on. I do however need to make a couple revisions to the board. Maybe after I finish finals up I will get back into the project some more. If you want to put up with some minor errors in the board and solder on your own BGA I have an extra board that I could send you to experiment with in the mean time.
I'm considering moving down to the QFN-100 package Spartan 3AN, because of the excessive amount of power this one has, it's not really necessary to have 200k gates for this type of controller.
How much cheaper would that be out of curiosity?
I only currently have one extra and Steve expressed interest in it first. I want to get the bugs worked out before I release a board to the public. As soon as I make the revision you guys are more than welcome to have a board to experiment with.
As I mentioned I want to switch it over to a QFN type package to aid with soldering.
Its not so much that i wanted one (though i do, but i wouldn't be able to use it as of now) it was just more to do with how much cheaper it would likely be with that chip rather then the other.
Registered Member #30656
Joined: Tue Jul 30 2013, 02:40AM
Location: UK
Posts: 208
The $10 difference in FPGA price is pretty insignificant in the bigger scheme of things. More important is how DIYable it ends up - avoiding a big BGA which can't be inspected after soldering is worthwhile.
Out of interest, are 100-QFN Spartan 3ANs even available? A quick check on digikey/xilinx sites showed a 144TQFP as the lowest pin-count package, no QFN to be seen. QFP would probably be a bit kinder anyway to those without hot air/reflow ovens, but is a bit bigger (22x22 vs 17x17 mm footprint for the BGA).
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HTCC (Hydra Tesla Coil Controller)
