Nos últimos anos, houve um grande avanço na computação reconfigurável, em particular em hardware que emprega Field-Programmable Gate Arrays. Porém, esse aumento de capacidade e desempenho aumentou a distância entre a capacidade de projeto e a disponibilidade de tecnologia para o desenvolvimento do projeto. As linguagens de programação imperativas de alto nível, como C, são mais apropriadas para o desenvolvimento de aplicativos complexos que as linguagens de descrição de hardware. Por isso, surgiram diversas ferramentas para o desenvolvimento de hardware a partir de código em C. A ferramenta ChipCflow, da qual faz parte este projeto, é uma delas. A execução dos programas por meio dessa ferramenta será completamente baseada em seu fluxo de dados, seguindo o modelo dinâmico encontrado nas arquiteturas de computadores a fluxo de dados, aproveitando ao máximo o paralelismo considerado natural desse modelo e as características do hardware parcialmente reconfigurável. Neste projeto em particular, o objetivo é a prova de conceito (proof of concept) para a criação de instâncias, em forma de operadores, de um algoritmo ChipCflow em hardware parcialmente reconfigurável, tendo como base a plataforma Virtex da Xilinx / In recent years, reconfigurable computing has become increasingly more advanced, especially in hardware that uses Field-Programmable Gate Arrays. However, the increase of performance in FPGAs accumulated the gap between design capacity and technology for the development of the design. Imperative high-level programming languages such as C are more appropriate for the development of complex algorithms than hardware description languages (HDL). For this reason, many ANSI C-like programming tools for the development of hardware came to existence. The ChipCflow project, of which this project is part, is one of these tools. The execution of algorithms through this tool will be completely directed by data flow, according to the dynamic model found on Dataflow Architectures, taking advantage of its natural high levels of parallelism and the characteristics of the partially reconfigurable hardware. In this project, the objective is a proof of concept for the creation of instances, in the form of operators, of a ChipCflow algorithm on a partially reconfigurable hardware, taking as reference the Xilinx Virtex boards

With the introduction of partially reconfigurable FPGAs, we are now able to perform dynamic changes to hardware running on an FPGA without halting the operation of the design. Module based partial reconfiguration allows the hardware designer to create multiple hardware modules that perform different tasks and swap them in and out of designated dynamic regions on an FPGA. However, the current mainstream partial reconfiguration flow provides a limited and inefficient approach that requires a strict set of guidelines to be met. This thesis introduces BitMaT, a tool that provides the low-level bitstream manipulation as a member tool of an alternative, automated, modular partial reconfiguration flow. / Master of Science

<p>The aim of this thesis was to configure an FPGA with high speed ports to capture data from a prototype 4 bit ΣΔ analogue-to-digital converter sending data at a rate of 2.4 Gbps in four channels and to develop a protocol for transferring the data to a PC for analysis. Data arriving in the four channels should be sorted into 4 bit words with one bit taken successively from each of the channels. A requirement on the data transfer was that the data in the four channels should arrive synchronously to the FPGA. A Virtex-5 FPGA on a LT110X platform was used with <em>Rocket^TMIO</em> GPT transceivers tightly integrated with the FPGA logic. Since the actual DUT (Device Under Test) was not in place during the work, the transceivers of the FPGA were used for both sending and receiving data. The transmission was shown to be successful for both eight and ten bit data widths. At this stage a small skew between the data in the four channels was observed. This was solved by storing the information in separate memories, one for each of the channels, to make possible to later form the 4 bit words in the PC (MatLab). The memories were two port FIFOs writing in data at 240 MHz (10 bit data width) or 300 MHz (8 bit data width) and read out at 50 MHz.</p> / <p>Syftet med examensarbetet var att konfigurera en FPGA med höghastighetsportar så att data från en prototyp av en 4 bitars ΣΔ analog-till-digital omvandlare kan samlas in med en hastighet av 2.4 Gbps i var och en av fyra kanaler och att utveckla ett protokoll för överföring av dessa data från FPGAn till en PC för analys. Insamlade data ska sorteras i 4 bitars ord med en bit successivt tagen från var och en av kanalerna. Ett krav på dataöverföringen var att data i de fyra kanalerna skulle anlända synkront till FPGAn. En Virtex-5 FPGA på en LT110X plattfrom användes med <em></em>GTP transceivrar tätt integrerade med FPGA logiken. Då utrustningen som skulle testas inte var tillgänglig under tiden arbetet utfördes användes FPGAns transceivrar till att både sända och ta emot data. Överföring av data med både 8 och 10 bitars datavidd uppnåddes framgångsrikt. Data i de fyra kanalerna visade sig dock inte anlända synkront till mottagaren. Detta problem löstes genom att lagra informationen i separata minnen, ett för varje kanal, överföra data från minnena till PCn och där med hjälp av MatLab sortera dem till 4 bitars ord. Som minnen användes tvåportars FIFOn där data skrivs in med en hastighet av 240 MHz (10 bitars datavidd) eller 300 MHZ (8 bitars datavidd) och läses ut med en hastighet av 50 MHz.</p>

<p>Communication and digital signal processing applications of today are often developed as fully integrated systems on one single chip and are implemented as application specific integrated circuits using e.g. VLSI technology. As the systems are getting more and more complex in terms of speed and performance the chip size and the design time tend to increase rapidly. This will result in search for cheaper and less time consuming alternatives. One alternative is field programmable gate arrays, so called FPGAs. The FPGAs are getting faster, cheaper and the number of gates increases all the time. A long list of ready to use functional blocks so called intellectual property (IP) blocks can be used in FPGAs. The latest FPGAs can also be bought with one or more embedded processors, in form of hard processor cores or as licenses for soft processor cores. This will speed up the design phase and of course also decrease the crucial time to market even more. </p><p>The purpose of this master’s thesis was to develop a waveform generator to generate a sine signal and a cosine signal, I and Q, used for radio/radar applications. The digital signals should have an output data rate of at least 100 MHz. The digital part of the system should be implemented in hardware using e.g. an FPGA. To convert the digital signals to analog signals two D/A converters are used. The analog signals, I and Q, should have a bandwidth of 1 MHz - 11 MHz. </p><p>The waveform generator was developed and implemented using a Virtex II FPGA from Xilinx. An embedded microprocessor within the FPGA, MicroBlaze, in form of a soft processor core was used to control the system. A user interface program running on the microprocessor was also developed. Testing of the whole system, both hardware and software, was done. The system is able to generate digital sine and cosine curves of an output data rate of 100 MHz.</p>

<p>Today, wireless communications is used more then ever before. Wired systems are replaced with wireless versions. New methods and transmission standards are developed and tested. The purpose of this thesis is development of a flexible high-performance System Test Platformfor test of the SoCTRix Wireless LAN Transceiver. </p><p>The result is a Xilinx Virtex-II FPGA based System Test Platform board with CardBus PC Card interface to a computer. The hardware achieved has the following features:</p><p>- 8-layer PCB</p><p>- PCMCIA CardBus PC Card interface, enabling 133 MB/s data throughput</p><p>- 1M Gate Virtex-II FPGA with reprogrammable configuration memory</p><p>- Debugging via LEDs and Logic Analyzer connectors</p><p>- 2x SPI EEPROM</p><p>- 40 MHz system clock</p><p>- Easy connection of two daughter-boards</p><p>Specially designed for wireless transmitter development, can also be used for other computer related highperformance applications.</p>

<p>Digital Radio Frequency Memory (DRFM) is a technique widely used by the defense industry in, for example, electronic countermeasure equipment for generating false radar targets. The purpose of the DRFM technique is to use high-speed sampling to digitally store and recreate radio frequency and microwave signals. At Saab Bofors Dynamics AB the technique is used, among others, in the Electronic Warfare Simulator (ELSI). The DRFM technique is implemented in a full-custom ASIC circuit that has been mounted on circuit boards in ELSI. Today, the progress in the programmable hardware field has made it possible to implement the DRFM design in a Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA). The FPGA technology has many advantages over a full custom ASIC design.</p><p>Hence, the purpose of this master's thesis has been to develop a new DRFM design that can be implemented in an FPGA, using a hardware description language called VHDL. The method for this master's thesis has been to first establish a time plan and a requirement specification. After that, a design specification has been worked out based on the requirement specification. The two specifications have served as a basis for the development of the DRFM circuit. One of the requirements on the design was that the circuit should be able to communicate through an external Ethernet interface. A part of the work has, thus, been to review available external Ethernet modules on the market. The result is a DRFM design that has been tested through simulations. The tests shows that the design works as described in the design specification.</p>

<p>Nowadays, FPGAs are large enough to host entire system-on-chip designs, wherein a soft core processor is often an integral part. High performance of the processor is always desirable, so there is an interest in finding faster solutions.This report aims to describe the work and results performed by Karl Bengtson and Olof Andersson at ISY. The task was to continue the development of a soft core microprocessor, originally created by Andreas Ehliar. The first step was to decide a more widely adopted instruction set for the processor. The choice fell upon the MIPS32 instruction set. The main work of the project has been focused on implementing support for MIPS32, allowing the processor to execute MIPS assembly language programs. The development has been done with speed optimization in mind. For every new function, the effects on the maximum frequency has been considered, and solutions not satisfying the speed requirements has been abandoned or revised.The performance has been measured by running a benchmark program—Coremark. Comparison has also been made to the main competitors among soft core processors. The results were positive, and reported a higher Coremark score than the other processors inthe study. The processor described herein still lacks many essential features. Nevertheless, the conclusion is that it may be possible to create a competitive alternative to established soft processors.</p> / <p>FPGAer används idag ofta för stora inbyggda system, i vilka en mjuk processor ofta spelar en viktig roll. Hög prestanda hos processorn är alltid önskvärt, så det finns ett intresse i att hitta snabbare lösningar. Denna rapport skall beskriva det arbete och de resultat som uppnåtts av Karl Bengtson och Olof Andersson på ISY. Uppgiften var att fortsätta utvecklandet av en mjuk processor, som ursprungligen skapats av Andreas Ehliar. Första steget var att välja ut en mer allmänt använd instruktionsuppsättning för processorn. Valet föll på instruktionsuppsättningsarkitekturen MIPS32. Projektets huvutarbete har varit fokuserat på att implementera stöd för MIPS32, vilket ger processorn möjlighet att köra assemblerprogram för MIPS.Utvecklingen har gjorts med hastighetsoptimering i beaktning. För varje ny funktion har dess effekter på maxfrekvensen undersökts,och lösningar som inte uppfyllt hastighetskraven har förkastats eller reviderats. Prestandan har mätts med programmet Coremark. Det har också gjorts jämförelser med huvudkonkurrenterna bland mjuka processorer. Resultaten var positiva, och rapporterade ett högre Coremarkpoäng än de andra processorerna i studien. Slutsatsen är att det ärmöjligt att skapa ett alternativ till de etablerade mjuka processorerna, men att denna processor fortfarande saknar väsentliga funktioner som behövs för att utgöra en mogen produkt.</p>

<p>Test Tools are very important in the design of a system. They generally simulate a working environment, only at a higher</p><p>speed, or with less frequently occurring test cases. In the verification of protocols based on the Fibre Channel physical layer,</p><p>this becomes a necessity, as errors can be non-existent or very unusual in normal operating environments. Most systems need</p><p>to be able to handle these unexpected events nonetheless. Therefore, there is a need for a method of introducing these errors</p><p>in a controlled way.</p><p>A bit error generation and logging tool for two proprietary protocols based on the Fibre Channel physical layer has been</p><p>developed. The hardware platform consists mainly of a Virtex II Pro FPGA with accompanying I/O support. Control of the</p><p>hardware is handled by a graphical user interface residing on a PC. Communication between the hardware and the PC is</p><p>handled with a UART. The final implementation can handle four parallel one way links, or two full duplex links,</p><p>independently. This report describes the implementation and the necessary theoretical background for this.</p>

The aim of this thesis was to configure an FPGA with high speed ports to capture data from a prototype 4 bit ΣΔ analogue-to-digital converter sending data at a rate of 2.4 Gbps in four channels and to develop a protocol for transferring the data to a PC for analysis. Data arriving in the four channels should be sorted into 4 bit words with one bit taken successively from each of the channels. A requirement on the data transfer was that the data in the four channels should arrive synchronously to the FPGA. A Virtex-5 FPGA on a LT110X platform was used with RocketTMIO GPT transceivers tightly integrated with the FPGA logic. Since the actual DUT (Device Under Test) was not in place during the work, the transceivers of the FPGA were used for both sending and receiving data. The transmission was shown to be successful for both eight and ten bit data widths. At this stage a small skew between the data in the four channels was observed. This was solved by storing the information in separate memories, one for each of the channels, to make possible to later form the 4 bit words in the PC (MatLab). The memories were two port FIFOs writing in data at 240 MHz (10 bit data width) or 300 MHz (8 bit data width) and read out at 50 MHz. / Syftet med examensarbetet var att konfigurera en FPGA med höghastighetsportar så att data från en prototyp av en 4 bitars ΣΔ analog-till-digital omvandlare kan samlas in med en hastighet av 2.4 Gbps i var och en av fyra kanaler och att utveckla ett protokoll för överföring av dessa data från FPGAn till en PC för analys. Insamlade data ska sorteras i 4 bitars ord med en bit successivt tagen från var och en av kanalerna. Ett krav på dataöverföringen var att data i de fyra kanalerna skulle anlända synkront till FPGAn. En Virtex-5 FPGA på en LT110X plattfrom användes med GTP transceivrar tätt integrerade med FPGA logiken. Då utrustningen som skulle testas inte var tillgänglig under tiden arbetet utfördes användes FPGAns transceivrar till att både sända och ta emot data. Överföring av data med både 8 och 10 bitars datavidd uppnåddes framgångsrikt. Data i de fyra kanalerna visade sig dock inte anlända synkront till mottagaren. Detta problem löstes genom att lagra informationen i separata minnen, ett för varje kanal, överföra data från minnena till PCn och där med hjälp av MatLab sortera dem till 4 bitars ord. Som minnen användes tvåportars FIFOn där data skrivs in med en hastighet av 240 MHz (10 bitars datavidd) eller 300 MHZ (8 bitars datavidd) och läses ut med en hastighet av 50 MHz.

Communication and digital signal processing applications of today are often developed as fully integrated systems on one single chip and are implemented as application specific integrated circuits using e.g. VLSI technology. As the systems are getting more and more complex in terms of speed and performance the chip size and the design time tend to increase rapidly. This will result in search for cheaper and less time consuming alternatives. One alternative is field programmable gate arrays, so called FPGAs. The FPGAs are getting faster, cheaper and the number of gates increases all the time. A long list of ready to use functional blocks so called intellectual property (IP) blocks can be used in FPGAs. The latest FPGAs can also be bought with one or more embedded processors, in form of hard processor cores or as licenses for soft processor cores. This will speed up the design phase and of course also decrease the crucial time to market even more. The purpose of this master’s thesis was to develop a waveform generator to generate a sine signal and a cosine signal, I and Q, used for radio/radar applications. The digital signals should have an output data rate of at least 100 MHz. The digital part of the system should be implemented in hardware using e.g. an FPGA. To convert the digital signals to analog signals two D/A converters are used. The analog signals, I and Q, should have a bandwidth of 1 MHz - 11 MHz. The waveform generator was developed and implemented using a Virtex II FPGA from Xilinx. An embedded microprocessor within the FPGA, MicroBlaze, in form of a soft processor core was used to control the system. A user interface program running on the microprocessor was also developed. Testing of the whole system, both hardware and software, was done. The system is able to generate digital sine and cosine curves of an output data rate of 100 MHz.