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Altera_Forum's avatar
Altera_Forum
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16 years ago

Simple Ethernet port.

I've been tasked with trying to get a simple ethernet port onto some of our specialty boards. For the most part they'd be used to send down control commands and read back simple status. Likely as not...
Altera_Forum's avatar
Altera_Forum
Icon for Honored Contributor rankHonored Contributor
16 years ago

Well, those above me are looking toward using ethernet in our boards from here forward versus any other method. I think they're dreaming of a "pie-in-the-sky" as they're possibly looking at 10Gbps ethernet in the future to replace the 2.5Gbps sFPDP presently used to transfer large blocks of data off our boards. I've told them that that isn't realistic but I don't think they believe me.

Why ethernet over USB (forget RS232 or 422 or any less than multi-Gbps serial or parallel interface)? Again that was they're decision.

How many ALMs or LUTs? I don't know but one of the people who made the decision saw a suggested Altera footprint for this that was some 4000+ registers and decided it was acceptable. I haven't found that design such that it meets the other limitations.

How many M4K blocks? Theoretically all 408 of them in the present target device. I've been told by the IP designer that he's used all 4 MRAM blocks and needs them but his design is not yet complete. If I need all 408 M4K blocks I could successfully argue to get them.