Digital Electronics and Design with VHDL
Digital Electronics and Design with VHDL offers a friendly presentation of the fundamental principles and practices of modern digital design. Unlike any other book in this field, transistor-level implementations are also included, which allow the readers to gain a solid understanding of a circuit's real potential and limitations, and to develop a realistic perspective on the practical design of actual integrated circuits.
Coverage includes the largest selection available of digital circuits in all categories (combinational, sequential, logical, or arithmetic); and detailed digital design techniques, with a thorough discussion on state-machine modeling for the analysis and design of complex sequential systems. Key technologies used in modern circuits are also described, including Bipolar, MOS, ROM/RAM, and CPLD/FPGA chips, as well as codes and techniques used in data storage and transmission. Designs are illustrated by means of complete, realistic applications using VHDL, where the complete code, comments, and simulation results are included.
This text is ideal for courses in Digital Design, Digital Logic, Digital Electronics, VLSI, and VHDL; and industry practitioners in digital electronics.
- Comprehensive coverage of fundamental digital concepts and principles, as well as complete, realistic, industry-standard designs
- Many circuits shown with internal details at the transistor-level, as in real integrated circuits
- Actual technologies used in state-of-the-art digital circuits presented in conjunction with fundamental concepts and principles
- Six chapters dedicated to VHDL-based techniques, with all VHDL-based designs synthesized onto CPLD/FPGA chips
Why Read This Book
You will get a practical, engineering-oriented foundation in digital design that ties VHDL coding to the real behavior of transistor-level circuits, so you learn not just how to describe hardware but why it behaves that way. The book's unusual inclusion of MOS transistor implementations and extensive circuit examples gives you a realistic view of limits, trade-offs, and implementation issues useful for FPGA and ASIC work.
Who Will Benefit
Undergraduate and early-career engineers or designers who want a solid bridge from digital-electronics fundamentals to VHDL-based implementation and realistic transistor-level understanding for FPGA/ASIC projects.
Level: Intermediate — Prerequisites: Basic algebra and Boolean logic, elementary circuit theory (voltage/current concepts), and familiarity with digital concepts such as logic gates and flip-flops; prior exposure to any HDL is helpful but not required.
Key Takeaways
- Describe combinational and sequential digital circuits clearly in VHDL and simulate them for correct functional behavior
- Design and analyze state machines for complex sequential systems and map behavioral models to implementable hardware
- Relate high-level HDL descriptions to transistor-level CMOS implementations to understand timing, power, and area trade-offs
- Implement common arithmetic, logic, and memory circuits and prepare them for synthesis targeting FPGAs or ASIC flows
- Apply practical design techniques for synchronous systems including timing considerations, clocking strategies, and metastability mitigation
Topics Covered
- Introduction to Digital Electronics and Design Methodology
- Number Systems, Codes, and Arithmetic
- Logic Gates and Transistor-Level CMOS Implementations
- Combinational Circuit Design and Optimization
- Arithmetic and Shifting Circuits (ALUs, adders, multipliers)
- Sequential Circuits and Storage Elements
- State Machines: Modeling, Analysis, and Design
- VHDL Fundamentals: Data Types, Modeling Styles, and Simulation
- VHDL for Combinational and Sequential Design
- Synthesis Considerations and Mapping to Programmable Logic
- Design Examples and Case Studies (from gates to systems)
- Timing, Clocking, and Practical Implementation Issues
- Appendices: MOS Device Basics, SPICE/Simulation Notes, VHDL Reference
Languages, Platforms & Tools
How It Compares
Compared with Brown & Vranesic's Fundamentals of Digital Logic with VHDL, Pedroni adds deeper transistor-level coverage and practical CMOS insight; compared to Mano's Digital Design, it is more applied and VHDL-centered while still covering underlying device implementations.
