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FPGA: Developing New Hardware

Concept Reply consults in "How and When" to choose a Field Programmable Gate Array Solution

FPGA: Developing new Hardware

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Designing a Real-Time Hardware

Several projects in the big world of embedded systems require real-time solutions. Even a simple buck/boost DC (direct current) converter requires a fast and accurate control loop, timing requirements for 3-phase BLDC (brushless DC) controllers are much stricter. Parallel processing of high-speed data streams is also a complicated task for stock CPUs.

Designing specialized hardware instead of using a stock CPU is usually the only way to satisfy requirements for a real-time task. Concept Reply outlines different hardware solutions, highlights advantages and disadvantages and provides helpful hints for a successful Hardware project.

Top 5 Solutions

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Bare Hardware

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MCU

(Micro-controller unit)

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SoC

(System on a chip)

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FPGA/CPLD

(Field-programmable gate array/complex programmable logic device)

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FPGA with Integrated CPU

(Central unit)

Development Steps

After the architectural decision is complete, development starts, focusing on the FPGA development process, as it is slightly different in comparison with the traditional MCU development.

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Vendor Selection

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Implementation

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Verification

Conclusion: A Combination of FPGA and CPU

The FPGA world is vast. In many parallelable tasks, FPGAs are far ahead of the traditional CPUs in terms of power efficiency, processing speed and reaction time. A combination of FPGA and CPU can simplify the implementation of the most complex tasks while keeping the design highly flexible.

Added Value with Concept Reply

Concept Reply as a leading IoT accelerator implements customer's requirements in the most efficient way on different hardware architectures. Based on the many years of experience in embedded software development, Concept Reply helps make the right decision at the very start of the project and goes smoothly through all steps on the way to a successful product.

Concept Reply

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Concept Reply is an IoT software developer specializing in the research, development and validation of innovative solutions and supports its customers in the automotive, manufacturing, smart infrastructure and other industries in all matters relating to the Internet of Things (IoT) and cloud computing. The goal is to offer end-to-end solutions along the entire value chain: from the definition of an IoT strategy, through testing and quality assurance, to the implementation of a concrete solution.