CPLD/FPGA, software and 10 years support

On Thursday, in article
     <uhejk2ltidps9p9etbcivre26c3di0okes@4ax.com>
     mike@whitewing.co.uk "Mike Harrison" wrote:

>>>The restriction on size is silly - just get a 2 GB flash drive.
>>
>>Consider the market the customer is in respecifying that part which has
>>been agreed upon is going to be a costly exercise adding at least 3 months
>>to project.
>
>How exactly does "Buy a bigger flash drive for anouther $20 or so" add 3 months
> to a project?

When several organisations are involved in the chain and half of them
are aerospace, getting things that have been specified changed takes
time and a LOT of paperwork.

-- 
Paul Carpenter          | paul@pcserviceselectronics.co.uk
<http://www.pcserviceselectronics.co.uk/>    PC Services
<http://www.gnuh8.org.uk/>              GNU H8 & mailing list info
<http://www.badweb.org.uk/>             For those web sites you hate

"Paul Carpenter" <paul$@pcserviceselectronics.co.uk> wrote in message
news:20061102.1433.321913snz@pcserviceselectronics.co.uk...
> When several organisations are involved in the chain and half of them
> are aerospace, getting things that have been specified changed takes
> time and a LOT of paperwork.

And how did a flash drive come into this picture? Typical data retention is
about 10 years.....

Meindert

Paul Carpenter wrote:
> On Wednesday, in article
>      <4B82h.22186$j4.16516@newsfe1-win.ntli.net>
>      hans64@ht-lab.com "Hans" wrote:
>
> >Hi Paul,
> >
> >Not sure if anybody mentioned it but I would also have a look Actel (e.g.
> >APA/A3E devices). Because they support military/avionics their devices are
> >not EOL'd so quickly, also some of their largest devices are available in
> >PQ240.
>
> Well it looks like some of the devices could do the job, but my quick look
> and the software seems a minefield of different applications and no real
> software overview (or even where it get device specific). Seeing thrid
> party support tools with Cadence and Mentor, gets scary on a very low
> production run ...
>
> >Just a thought,
>
> Appreciated and looking at everyone's suggestions as a broad search helps
> especially when I might not have experience of some vendors' tools, or best
> ways to obtain them.
>
> >Hans.
> >www.ht-lab.com
> >
> >
> >"Paul Carpenter" <paul$@pcserviceselectronics.co.uk> wrote in message
> >news:20061101.1341.321856snz@pcserviceselectronics.co.uk...
> >>I know others here have to deal with long life time support of designs, and
> >>I
> >> have one where I ahev to also supply the tools (free or paid) so that
> >> customer
> >> can support in at least 10 years time. The trouble is the design
> >> necessitates
> >> a PLD/CPLD/FPGA, so the requirements get quite onerous....
> >>
> >> Device
> ..
>
> --
> Paul Carpenter          | paul@pcserviceselectronics.co.uk
> <http://www.pcserviceselectronics.co.uk/>    PC Services
> <http://www.gnuh8.org.uk/>              GNU H8 & mailing list info
> <http://www.badweb.org.uk/>             For those web sites you hate

Paul;
Take a look at Xilinx XC9500XL family - similar to XC9500 family but
low power.   XL runs on 3.3v, but is 5 volt I/O tolerant.  The
XC95144XL looks like it will meet your requirements (it has 144 regs,
81 I/Os in TQFP-100 package), and it looks like it may meet your Icc
requirements, too.  9500XL is also cheaper than 9500, but for 10 units
I don't suppose that matters.  As others have suggested, use older
versions of Xilinx's ISE.  ISE 8.x is so bleeping big that it doen't
fit on a CD - only on a DVD.  
HTH
-Dave Pollum

On 2 Nov, in article
     <1162483108.159431.42200@m7g2000cwm.googlegroups.com>
     vze24h5m@verizon.net wrote:

>Paul Carpenter wrote:
>> On Wednesday, in article
>>      <4B82h.22186$j4.16516@newsfe1-win.ntli.net>
>>      hans64@ht-lab.com "Hans" wrote:
>>
>> >Hi Paul,
>> >
>> >Not sure if anybody mentioned it but I would also have a look Actel (e.g.
>> >APA/A3E devices). Because they support military/avionics their devices are
>> >not EOL'd so quickly, also some of their largest devices are available in
>> >PQ240.
>>
>> Well it looks like some of the devices could do the job, but my quick look
>> and the software seems a minefield of different applications and no real
>> software overview (or even where it get device specific). Seeing thrid
>> party support tools with Cadence and Mentor, gets scary on a very low
>> production run ...
>>
>> >Just a thought,
>>
>> Appreciated and looking at everyone's suggestions as a broad search helps
>> especially when I might not have experience of some vendors' tools, or best
>> ways to obtain them.
>>
>> >Hans.
>> >www.ht-lab.com
>> >
>> >
>> >"Paul Carpenter" <paul$@pcserviceselectronics.co.uk> wrote in message
>> >news:20061101.1341.321856snz@pcserviceselectronics.co.uk...
>> >>I know others here have to deal with long life time support of designs, and
>> >>I
>> >> have one where I ahev to also supply the tools (free or paid) so that
>> >> customer
>> >> can support in at least 10 years time. The trouble is the design
>> >> necessitates
>> >> a PLD/CPLD/FPGA, so the requirements get quite onerous....
>> >>
>> >> Device
>> ..
>>
>Paul;
>Take a look at Xilinx XC9500XL family - similar to XC9500 family but
>low power.   XL runs on 3.3v, but is 5 volt I/O tolerant.  The
>XC95144XL looks like it will meet your requirements (it has 144 regs,
>81 I/Os in TQFP-100 package), and it looks like it may meet your Icc
>requirements, too.  9500XL is also cheaper than 9500, but for 10 units
>I don't suppose that matters.

Thanks will look at it as the XC9500 looked close.

>As others have suggested, use older versions of Xilinx's ISE.

After umptten survey forms eventually managed to find the pages, will
look at trying an older version shortly.

>  ISE 8.x is so bleeping big that it doen't
>fit on a CD - only on a DVD.  

I think it has got to the predicted stage of

  <http://www.pcserviceselectronics.co.uk/fun.htm#1086>

>HTH
>-Dave Pollum
>
>

-- 
Paul Carpenter          | paul@pcserviceselectronics.co.uk
<http://www.pcserviceselectronics.co.uk/>    PC Services
<http://www.gnuh8.org.uk/>              GNU H8 & mailing list info
<http://www.badweb.org.uk/>             For those web sites you hate

Paul Carpenter wrote:
> On Thursday, in article
>      <uhejk2ltidps9p9etbcivre26c3di0okes@4ax.com>
>      mike@whitewing.co.uk "Mike Harrison" wrote:
> 
>>>> The restriction on size is silly - just get a 2 GB flash drive.
>>> Consider the market the customer is in respecifying that part which has
>>> been agreed upon is going to be a costly exercise adding at least 3 months
>>> to project.
>> How exactly does "Buy a bigger flash drive for anouther $20 or so" add 3 months
>> to a project?
> 
> When several organisations are involved in the chain and half of them
> are aerospace, getting things that have been specified changed takes
> time and a LOT of paperwork.
> 

It sounds very much like this project is being run backwards.  Petty 
decisions like the size and medium for archiving are decided in advance, 
while real, important decisions like the tools and devices are left 
until later.

On Thu, 02 Nov 2006 14:33:16 +0000 (GMT), paul$@pcserviceselectronics.co.uk (Paul Carpenter) wrote:

>On Thursday, in article
>     <uhejk2ltidps9p9etbcivre26c3di0okes@4ax.com>
>     mike@whitewing.co.uk "Mike Harrison" wrote:
>
>>>>The restriction on size is silly - just get a 2 GB flash drive.
>>>
>>>Consider the market the customer is in respecifying that part which has
>>>been agreed upon is going to be a costly exercise adding at least 3 months
>>>to project.
>>
>>How exactly does "Buy a bigger flash drive for anouther $20 or so" add 3 months
>> to a project?
>
>When several organisations are involved in the chain and half of them
>are aerospace, getting things that have been specified changed takes
>time and a LOT of paperwork.

Maybe the spec should have been simplified to "a sufficiently large drive..." instead of specifiying
it explicitly..!
Or if it's more about approving specific devices, would "just use 2 of them" be an easier option...

"Paul Carpenter" <paul$@pcserviceselectronics.co.uk> wrote in message 
news:20061101.2303.321878snz@pcserviceselectronics.co.uk...
> On Wednesday, in article
>     <4B82h.22186$j4.16516@newsfe1-win.ntli.net>
>     hans64@ht-lab.com "Hans" wrote:
>
>>Hi Paul,
>>
>>Not sure if anybody mentioned it but I would also have a look Actel (e.g.
>>APA/A3E devices). Because they support military/avionics their devices are
>>not EOL'd so quickly, also some of their largest devices are available in
>>PQ240.
>
> Well it looks like some of the devices could do the job, but my quick look
> and the software seems a minefield of different applications and no real
> software overview (or even where it get device specific). Seeing thrid
> party support tools with Cadence and Mentor, gets scary on a very low
> production run ...

Hi Paul,

Not sure about the minefield, Actel's P&R is called Designer. The third 
party tools are Modelsim for simulation (same for ISE/Quartus/ispLever) and 
Synplicity for synthesis. All these tools are called/invoked from Libero 
which is their development environment. I have no experience with Libero but 
I understand that Libero gold is free and allow you to target devices up to 
a million "marketing gates". I only use Designer and although it is much 
slower than ISE/Quartus it is quite easy to use.  See the link below for a 
simple design I implemented on their ProASIC+ prototype board,

http://www.ht-lab.com/freecores/pingpong/pingpong.htm

Regards,
Hans.
www.ht-lab.com


>
>>Just a thought,
>
> Appreciated and looking at everyone's suggestions as a broad search helps
> especially when I might not have experience of some vendors' tools, or 
> best
> ways to obtain them.
>
>>Hans.
>>www.ht-lab.com
>>
>>
>>"Paul Carpenter" <paul$@pcserviceselectronics.co.uk> wrote in message
>>news:20061101.1341.321856snz@pcserviceselectronics.co.uk...
>>>I know others here have to deal with long life time support of designs, 
>>>and
>>>I
>>> have one where I ahev to also supply the tools (free or paid) so that
>>> customer
>>> can support in at least 10 years time. The trouble is the design
>>> necessitates
>>> a PLD/CPLD/FPGA, so the requirements get quite onerous....
>>>
>>> Device
> ..
>
> -- 
> Paul Carpenter          | paul@pcserviceselectronics.co.uk
> <http://www.pcserviceselectronics.co.uk/>    PC Services
> <http://www.gnuh8.org.uk/>              GNU H8 & mailing list info
> <http://www.badweb.org.uk/>             For those web sites you hate
> 

> ...
> Take a look at Xilinx XC9500XL family - similar to XC9500 family but
> low power.   XL runs on 3.3v, but is 5 volt I/O tolerant.  The
> XC95144XL looks like it will meet your requirements (it has 144 regs,
> 81 I/Os in TQFP-100 package), and it looks like it may meet your Icc
> requirements, too.

That might work, just be carefull with driving true 5V devices from the
CPLD.  In fact, I am thinking about power switching an XC9536XL between
3.3V and 5V, to deal with the voltage translations.  I have done it
with an AVR, not sure it it will work with the XC9536XL yet.