WEBENCH aids FPGA power supply design

13 October 2010 News

A new addition to National Semiconductor’s WEBENCH offering is FPGA Power Architect, an online design tool to model and optimise power supplies for FPGAs.

The tool incorporates the detailed supply requirements of more than 130 of the newest FPGA devices from Altera and Xilinx.

Modern power supply systems, including those for advanced FPGAs, are complex to design, often incorporating multiple unique loads to drive precisely specified voltages. In addition to the required voltages and currents, each load may have specific limitations for ripple, noise filtering, synchronisation and separation of supplies, as well as startup definitions. The power supply designs delivered by WEBENCH incorporate comprehensive power requirements published by the FPGA manufacturers, giving the designer confidence that their power supplies will meet these constraints while saving critical time in the process.

To begin a design, the designer selects an FPGA from Altera or Xilinx and the tool automatically populates the unique power requirements, identifying core and I/O options for every potential load of that array. Once tuned by the designer, WEBENCH collects all the loads and creates multiple power supply architectures as options for driving the FPGA and the total system.

The power supply may involve one or more intermediate voltage rails between the input supply and the point-of-load regulators. The designer can tune the recommended power supply with the turn of a dial, reducing size, increasing efficiency or lowering complete system cost in seconds. The designer can also order components for prototyping, share the complete system with others, or print a complete project report including schematics, bill of materials (BOM) and performance characteristics.

For more information visit www.national.com/FPGAarchitect

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