Daniel wrote: > As I understand it, only the "net list loader" (is that what they > call it?) that loads the synthesized logic into the FPGA is not > available as a free tool.
I wrote: > No. The free tools include an unrestricted "Impact", which is the > FPGA loader. It can load the 3S4000 without any difficulty. > However, I suspect that end users of the card would never use Impact. Daniel wrote: > Why? Because we will provide our own logic-loading path, e.g., over > PCI? Yes. Impact doesn't know about that. It's designed to work with the Parallel Cable 3, Parallel Cable 4, Multilinx, and such. And AFAIK it doesn't have a published API for plugins to support different hardware. I wrote: > What Webpack 7.1i cannot do is synthesize, place, and route a design > for a 3S4000. So anyone doing RTL development would either need to > buy the full ISE package, or use Webpack 6.3i with the service pack, > since that has full 3S4000 support. Daniel wrote: > Right, so our job should be to convince Xilinx to let the webpack handle > the 3S4000. Why? Is something wrong with Webpack 6.3i? Certainly I think it would be a good thing for Xilinx to include the 3S4000 in 7.2i, but it's not like there's no alternative. > We need a commitment from Xilinx _before_ we go ahead. Again, what's wrong with Webpack 6.3i? It's still available for download, and with the service pack, it includes 3S4000 support. The only drawback is that it doesn't run natively on Linux, but I've run it using Wine, and using Window with VMware. I think building 3S1500 cards is a distraction, and will just make the project logistics more complex unnecessarily and slow things down. Eric _______________________________________________ Open-graphics mailing list [email protected] http://lists.duskglow.com/mailman/listinfo/open-graphics List service provided by Duskglow Consulting, LLC (www.duskglow.com)
