I have a V4FX based product and I'd like to have a DSP coprocessor to go with the the powerpc that handles my operating system. Are there TI c54x or c3x soft cores out there that could be compiled into a xilinx fpga? Could be anyone's dsp, I suppose, so long as it has a large existing code base and mature tools. Also is microblaze an option? Can it do significant DSP? Thanks, Clark
TI DSP soft core in Xilinx?
Started by ●November 15, 2007
Reply by ●November 16, 20072007-11-16
"cpope" <cepope@nc.rr.com> wrote in message news:473cdc7a$0$2339$4c368faf@roadrunner.com...>Are there TI c54x or > c3x soft cores out there that could be compiled into a xilinx fpga? >You are kidding aren't you! For many years TI have been paranoid about application specific FPGA-based designs stealing market share from their DSPs. You only have to mention the word "FPGA" to a TI DSP sales or marketing person to get their blood boiling.
Reply by ●November 16, 20072007-11-16
"David Spencer" <davidmspencer@verizon.net> wrote in message news:i7j%i.187$xt5.59@trnddc07...> > "cpope" <cepope@nc.rr.com> wrote in message > news:473cdc7a$0$2339$4c368faf@roadrunner.com... > >Are there TI c54x or > > c3x soft cores out there that could be compiled into a xilinx fpga? > > > > You are kidding aren't you! For many years TI have been paranoid about > application specific FPGA-based designs stealing market share from their > DSPs. You only have to mention the word "FPGA" to a TI DSP sales or > marketing person to get their blood boiling. > >Well from TI's perspective seems to me like a chance to make money off of IP they already have. There is a lot of code out there that for c3x or c4x and so on that could drop right in to a system like mine. Compared to the NRE to rewrite an existing app they can charge a fair amount for a core license. Right now they're probably making nothing off of these old cores. But it doesn't have to be TI. Motorola or analog devices could do the same. -Clark
Reply by ●November 16, 20072007-11-16
David Spencer wrote:> "cpope" <cepope@nc.rr.com> wrote in message > news:473cdc7a$0$2339$4c368faf@roadrunner.com... >> Are there TI c54x or >> c3x soft cores out there that could be compiled into a xilinx fpga? >> > > You are kidding aren't you! For many years TI have been paranoid about > application specific FPGA-based designs stealing market share from their > DSPs. You only have to mention the word "FPGA" to a TI DSP sales or > marketing person to get their blood boiling. > >Actually, a start has been done at opencores: http://www.opencores.org/projects.cgi/web/oc54x/overview
Reply by ●November 16, 20072007-11-16
All, That would make no sense at all (to have a TI DSP soft core) in an FPGA! It is far less expensive to just buy the part from TI. As for making TI 'uncomfortable', we consider TI a great partner: they sell their DSPs into many markets, and when they can't do something fast enough, they sell their DSPs and our FPGAs. If we sell our FPGA into a market, and there is a TI DSP that can do a job where we are not competitive, we encourage the customer to use TI, too. Are there some jobs that TI wins, or we win exclusively (the other is just not needed)? Sure. That happens if we were partners, or not. We sell, they sell. It is not a "zero-sum" game where there can only be one winner every time: we are all winning (customer, Xilinx, TI)! Customer knows that Xilinx and TI are working together to provide them with the best solution to their problems. Austin
Reply by ●November 17, 20072007-11-17
"austin" <austin@xilinx.com> wrote in message news:fhl3m9$19o1@cnn.xilinx.com...> All, > > That would make no sense at all (to have a TI DSP soft core) in an FPGA! >That's like saying it makes no sense at all to have a powerpc or a microblaze in an FPGA? I have a v4fx system, I'd like a dsp coprocessor. I don't want to waste the board space or power consumption for a dedicated DSP since not all applications will need/use it. For wideband signal processing apps I can use the fpga fabric, for narrowband stuff I can use a softcore with floating point DSP. -Clark