Product category: Programmable Logic Devices
News Release from: Altera Europe | Subject: CC-1 Stratix FPGA-based PCI card
Edited by the Electronicstalk Editorial Team on 11 April 2007
DSP product shrinks from
eight boards to one
An audio-systems specialist has used FPGAs to shrink an eight-board, 64 DSP device-based design to a single, Stratix FPGA-based PCI card
Audio-production systems specialist Fairlight is applying the flexibility and digital signal processing (DSP) advantages of Altera FPGAs to shrink an eight-board, 64 DSP device-based design to a single, Stratix FPGA-based PCI card. 'Our Crystal Core (CC-1) architecture demonstrates how Altera FPGAs deliver superior price-performance for DSP functions', says Tino Fibaek, Fairlight's Chief Technology Officer.
This article was originally published on Electronicstalk on 11 April 2007 at 8.00am (UK)
Related stories
Low-cost FPGA family available in production
Built on TSMC's 65nm low-power process, the Cyclone III family includes devices that are qualified for commercial, industrial and extended temperatures
FPGA-based image processing makes reversing safer
Single-chip FPGA-based approach provides a more compact and reliable solution than DSP-based approaches, which typically require two or more devices
'Altera's development tools helped make this project the smoothest engineering effort I have ever witnessed'.
'We completed our development in one-third the time it would have taken to complete a DSP device-based architecture'.
Crystal Core technology makes obsolete DSP/time-slice bus-based media processing architectures and delivers major performance gains while reducing hardware complexity and cost.
Further reading
FPGAs race to DDR3 interface speeds
Higher memory bandwidth enables new communications, computing and video processing applications that were either previously impossible or required doubling the number of memory banks
Complex PLDs cut power and package size
MAX IIZ devices deliver the many benefits of CPLDs - including flexibility, faster time to market and board-level integration - to handsets and other portable applications
When compared with competitive products, the CC-1 enables significantly improved signal processing quality, broader system capability and previously unattainable price/performance gains.
'This design demonstrates the superior flexibility and the signal processing advantages of FPGAs versus traditional DSP devices', says Dr Nick Tredennick, Editor of Gilder Technology Report.
'The reduced hardware complexity between the new and old systems offers important implementation and time to market advantages'.
Fairlight uses the hardware flexibility of Altera FPGAs, rather than the fixed bit-width of DSP devices, to simultaneously run multiple processes at different bit depths.
The company refers to this feature as dynamic resolution optimisation (DRO), which allows audio engineers to choose the best level of processing for each system task.
With DRO, equalisation processing can be performed at 72bit floating-point precision, while mixing is performed with 36bit floating point precision and metering functions at 16bit fixed-point resolution.
This provides greater performance at a lower system cost, resulting in notably enhanced audio quality.
Fairlight applies the FPGA's programmability, enabling a universal hardware platform for a number of media applications requiring real-time audio and video processing power.
For example, the CC-1 deployed for sound design activities can be redeployed as a high-definition (HD) video colour grader and later be repurposed for a music recording session.
• Altera Europe: contact details and other news
• Email this article to a colleague
• Register for the free Electronicstalk email newsletter
• Electronicstalk Home Page
Search the Pro-Talk network of sites
