Location: Stand 356, Hall 12
Altera will present their embedded systems solutions for the industrial and automotive markets. Altera says its FPGAs offer high levels of flexibility, cost-effectiveness, and reduction in development time while eliminating the risk of obsolescence.
Using the configurable Nios II 32-bit RISC processor and the SOPC Builder system design tool, automotive developers can quickly create their own custom microcontrollers. These customized microcontrollers include hardware feature sets that can be tailored to match system requirements and avoid the risk of obsolescence that can be associated with ASSP solutions. Altera's embedded tools are supported by a library of IP that includes pre-defined and scalable IP functions for automotive graphics, audio processing, driver assistance and car networking. Once a solution has been tested and verified using an FPGA, it can be migrated to a HardCopy II structured ASIC in order to lower the cost of the device for volume production.
Altera's programmable logic devices are available in industrial and extended automotive temperature range. Also available are development platforms and reference designs for automotive applications that enable designers to develop cost effective, differentiated and flexible systems. Automotive solutions from Altera include:
- LCD graphics based automotive instrument cluster display
- Driver for dual-view display (Sharp)
- Central gateway for car networking
- MOST reference design for audio transport
- Flexray/Autosar implementation (Nios II, HardCopy)
- Blaupunkt Travel Pilot auto navigation (Nios II, Cyclone)
Altera also offers industrial solutions. Unlike ASIC or ASSP-based systems, systems built using FPGAs enable designers to respond quickly to changing market requirements.
Industrial Ethernet is an excellent example of an application where the rapidly changing market dynamic is already being seen. The challenge of implementing Industrial Ethernet is the increasing number of different standards. Being programmable, FPGAs provide the foundation for solutions that can support multiple standards, both present and future. Manufacturers can also ensure interoperability and reduce costs by supporting several standards on one FPGA-based platform, and designers can benefit from the reusability of IPs, rapid time-to-market, and obsolescence avoidance.
It can be advantageous to partition complex industrial designs between an ASIC-based processor and FPGA. This combination may offer the best of both worlds. Developers get the software IP and tools support from the processor device vendor and their partners, and can use the standard peripherals in the processor device; and they also get the flexibility of the FPGA.
Altera's demonstrations and solutions for industrial applications at Embedded World will include:
- Support for many IE protocols from a single FPGA based platform
- SnakeBytes — High-performance single board reference platform with client specific I/Os (Stratix II, SOPC Builder)
- Flexible development platform for developing processor/FPGA hybrid systems
- Obsolescence proof PCI based graphics card for industrial applications (Cyclone II)
- Low cost FPGA based industrial PLC (Phoenix ILC 150 with Cyclone and Nios II)
- IEEE1588 development board
- Bluetooth add-on modules
For more information, go to www.altera.com.