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What is FPGA? 2. What is ASIC? How does an FPGA and ASIC differ in terms of function and usage? 3. Give applications of FPGA and ASIC. 4. What is Hardware Description Language? 5. What is Verilog and VHDL? How do they differ in terms of coding?

1. Field-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs) are reprogrammable silicon chips. Ross Freeman, the cofounder of Xilinx, invented the first FPGA in 1985. FPGA chip adoption across all industries is driven by the fact that FPGAs combine the best parts of application-specific integrated circuits (ASICs) and processor-based systems. FPGAs provide hardware-timed speed and reliability, but they do not require high volumes to justify the large upfront expense of custom ASIC design. 2. The term 'ASIC' stands for 'application-specific integrated circuit'. An ASIC is basically an integrated circuit designed specifically for a special purpose or application. Strictly speaking, this also implies that an ASIC is built only for one and only one customer. An example of an ASIC is an IC designed for a specific line of cellular phones of a company, whereby no other products can use it except the cell phones belonging to that product line. The opposite of an ASIC is a standard product or general purpose IC, such as a logic gate or a general purpose microcontroller, both of which can be used in any electronic application by anybody.

http://www.xilinx.com/fpga/asic.htm

FPGA vs. ASIC

What is the Difference Between a FPGA and an ASIC?
Field Programmable Gate Arrays (FPGAs) and Application Specific Integrated Circuits (ASICs) provide different values to designers, and they must be carefully evaluated before choosing any one over the other. Information abounds that compares the two technologies. While FPGAs used to be selected for lower speed/complexity/volume designs in the past, todays FPGAs easily push the 500MHz performance barrier. With unprecedented logic density increases and a host of other features, such as embedded processors, DSP blocks, clocking, and high-speed serial at ever lower price points, FPGAs are a compelling proposition for almost any type of design.

FPGA vs. ASIC Design Advantages

FPGA Design Advantage

Faster time-to-market No upfront non-recurring expenses (NRE) Simpler design cycle More predictable project cycle Field reprogramability

Benefit
No layout, masks or other manufacturing steps are needed Costs typically associated with an ASIC design Due to software that handles much of the routing, placement, and timing Due to elimination of potential re-spins, wafer capacities, etc. A new bitstream can be uploaded remotely

ASIC Design Advantage Benefit

Full custom capability Lower unit costs Smaller form factor

For design since device is manufactured to design specs For very high volume designs Since device is manufactured to design specs

FPGA vs. ASIC Design Flow

The FPGA design flow eliminates the complex and time-consuming floorplanning, place and route, timing analysis, and mask / re-spin stages of the project since the design logic is already synthesized to be placed onto an already verified, characterized FPGA device. However, when needed, Xilinx provides the advanced floorplanning, hierarchical design, and timing tools to allow users to maximize performance for the most demanding designs.

FPGA vs. ASIC Design Flow Comparison

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3. Applications of FPGAs include digital signal processing, software-defined

radio, ASIC prototyping, medical imaging, computer vision, speech recognition, cryptography, bioinformatics, computer hardware emulation, radio astronomy, metal detection and a growing range of other areas. FPGAs originally began as competitors to CPLDs and competed in a similar space, that of glue logic for PCBs. As their size, capabilities, and speed increased, they began to take over larger and larger functions to the state where some are now marketed as full systems on chips (SoC). Particularly with the introduction of dedicated multipliers into FPGA architectures in the late 1990s, applications which had [25][26] traditionally been the sole reserve of DSPs began to incorporate FPGAs instead. Traditionally, FPGAs have been reserved for specific vertical applications where the volume of production is small. For these low-volume applications, the premium that companies pay in hardware costs per unit for a programmable chip is more affordable than the development resources spent on creating an ASIC for a low-volume application. Today, new cost and performance dynamics have broadened the range of viable applications. Common FPGA Applications Aerospace and Defense Avionics/DO-254 MILCOM Missiles & Munitions

Secure Solutions Space

ASIC Prototyping Audio Connectivity Solutions Portable Electronics Radio Digital Signal Processing (DSP)

Automotive High Resolution Video Image Processing Vehicle Networking and Connectivity Automotive Infotainment

Broadcast Real-Time Video Engine EdgeQAM Encoders Displays Switches and Routers

Consumer Electronics Digital Displays Digital Cameras Multi-function Printers Portable Electronics Set-top Boxes

Data Center Servers Security Routers Switches Gateways Load Balancing

High Performance Computing Servers Super Computers

SIGINT Systems High-end RADARS High-end Beam Forming Systems Data Mining Systems

Industrial Industrial Imaging Industrial Networking Motor Control

Medical Ultrasound CT Scanner MRI X-ray PET Surgical Systems

Security Industrial Imaging Secure Solutions Image Processing

Video & Image Processing High Resolution Video Video Over IP Gateway Digital Displays Industrial Imaging

Wired Communications Optical Transport Networks Network Processing Connectivity Interfaces

Wireless Communications Baseband Connectivity Interfaces Mobile Backhaul Radio

Application Examples for ASICs

http://www.prema.com/Application/applications.html
Battery management for household appliances Low noise audio circuit Analog ASIC for industrial environment Sensitive photo transistors and opto sensors DC-DC converters from 0.9V supply voltage Control circuit for cycle rear light 80V Linear Regulator Interface circuit for bar code readers Control and evaluation circuit for motion detectors Timer electronics Interface and signal processing electronics for sensors (light, vibration and magnetic field) Control circuit for mobile phones

4. Designers of digital ASICs use a hardware description language (HDL), such as Verilog or VHDL, to describe the functionality of ASICs. 5. http://www.1-core.com/library/digital/fpga-design-tutorial/hdl.shtml

Hardware description languages

FPGA design services 1-CORE Technologies provides FPGA design services of high quality since 2004. Outsourcing FPGA design to Russia will significantly reduce your design costs. The basic level for FPGA design entry is Register Transfer Level which represents a digital circuit as a set of connected primitives (adders, counter, multiplexers, registers etc.). There are two basic ways to create an RTL design: schematic entry and HDL entry. Schematic entry is somewhat close to netlist: it is not very convenient to use it for large projects. HDL entry is more convenient, but needs an additional program (synthesizer) in order to translate HDL description to netlist. Hardware description languages were designed merely to provide means of digital circuits simulation. Synthesizers were created much later. Therefore, each major HDL language has two subsets of language constructs: synthesizable (suitable for synthesis) and non-synthesizable (suitable only for simulation).

The two major HDL languages are VHDL and Verilog. Both of these languages are widespread. VHDL is more Pascal-like (or, to be more precise, Ada-like) and Verilog is more similar to C. VHDL is a strongtyped language, and Verilog is more weak-typed. The syntax constructs of HDL languages are similar to those of conventional programming languages. However, the semantics is quite different. Note that in VHDL identifiers are case-insensitive, and in Verilog they are case-sensitive.