Customer Reviews

FPGA Prototyping by VHDL Examples: Xilinx Spartan-3 Version

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This is one of the best introductory VHDL books out there. Even though it does not focus on the VHDL Language itself it does demonstrate the use of VHDL and the hardware design methodology via practical design examples. All explanantions are clear and easy to follow. The design examples provided in the book are very practical (UART, PS2, VGA controller). The examples themselves are designed using the hardware design methodologies presented (FSM-based and FSMD-based). Finally the Picoblaze section in the textbook is the best treatize of the picoblaze micro that I've seen this far.

For those interested in a more rigourous treatment of the VHDL language, design methodology and synthesis issues (but not practical examples) I also highly recoommend "RTL Hardware Design Using VHDL: Coding for Efficiency, Portability, and Scalability" by the same author.

Great book - It states teaching VHDL is not its goal; the goal is FPGA programming in a general way to be transportable across various FPGAs while apologizing for the need to use a specific hardware board for the examples. The board is the Xilinx Spartan-3 evaluation board which is readily available for ~$200. It starts with an easy logic structure and ends with a complex pico-Blaze soft-core embedded processor project. It has memory controllers, LCD and PS/2 keyboard controllers in between. Each example has the full VHDL code and many compare alternate HDL coding approaches. Thus, while VHDL syntax is not covered directly, if you want the construct of a multiplexer or a serial port, or more complex functions, the examples serve as an excellent starting point and will continue to provide solid building blocks for future projects. If you are having difficulty sorting out the starting point in the fog of VHDL, ISE tools, RTL, footprints, and all else related to FPGAs using this book in conjunction with the Xilinx Spartan-3 evaluation board will point you in the right direction. Within a matter of a few days to a couple of weeks you will understand the key elements, the order they are applied and be able to demonstrate them in actual hardware. To become an expert is a long path, finding the trail head is always a good start. Once you are comfortable with the FPGA coding process "Circuit Design with VHDL" by Volnei A. Pedroni is an excellent reference book on VHDL for future projects.

I have spent many years amassing a collection of every book on FPGA on the market! Ok, maybe that's pushing it...However, compared to what most books lack in practical examples, this one I find is a complete GEM! From the beginning to the end it keeps you going with interesting, real world examples of what can be done with a Digilent Spartan Starter Kit. The author, Prof. P. Chu does an excellent job at progressivelly building your understanding of FPGA logic design, through a series of chapters that gradually take you to the more advanced stages of design in easily comprehensible lessons that require more elevated skills as one approaches the end chapters. The beauty of this book is that it uses the lessons learned prior to take you to the next level. I've used Prof. Chu's samples and interfaced them with a PIC and ARM9 development boards respectivelly, just to spice in some more fun and excitement. I may be considering launching a free site for the microcontroller sample code interfacing to his functional FPGA examples with his prior consent! There are lessons on dealing with numbers, such as the illusive negative integers and floats represented in binary logic. These are not borring discussions. They are well explained and straight to the point, complete with test benches and some of them can even be ran in the Xilinx simulator. The muxing example for LEDs should be the starting point of all experiments. It's that useful! The chapter on circular buffers is alone worth the price of the book! The memory interfacing and the VGA interfacing are priceless chapters as well! Try looking at a Xilinx sample for memory interfacing! PHEW... I cannot rave enough about the amount of work he has put into this...This is not a lazy approach to book writing! It's methodical, complete, well illustrated and there are samples included and they all work as described in the book! If you are new to FPGA, this book may be the top stepping stone you're after! It should be on everybody's book shelf who deals with FPGA logic design and I'm considering buying another one, just in case I loose the first one...Yes, it's that good! Brilliant work Prof. Chu, please keep em' going! It's people like yourself that make VHDL learning fun and exciting again!

I have been looking for a book like this for 2 years now. It is the first book I know of that is actually written about a current development board. The author does a great job of teaching you many of the basic concepts you need to get going. I hope that people at Xilinx stand up and take notice of what the author has done. If you ask me, Xilinx's marketing or technical support department should have written this book. If you want to get involved with fpga development, then buy this book and the development board. I'm recommending this book to several other software engineers as well as some of my students. Well done Prof Chu!

Hi, I have been working with MCUs but I liked to start to play with FPGA to fill the gap I had for some new electronic projects, although I develop application software since long time ago I have no idea about VHDL and FPGAs were totally unknown to me. This book it is very clear and practical so with cheap FPGA boards and free software you can start to work from simple to more comples projects.

The author does a great job presenting just enough of the language to be productive and correct while providing interesting examples of actual working code right from the start. This approach worked much better for me than the typical approach of presenting all the language constructs before moving on to applications.

Word of warning: do not purchase the Kindle version. It has not been proofread at all. The content and formatting of the code examples and in-text references to identifiers is entirely jumbled and nearly every example is incorrect, sometimes severely. After suffering through three chapters with my secret decoder ring I finally gave up and requested a refund. I've already ordered a hardcopy to continue my reading.

Very well written book, in a practical style. It's not a recipe book, it actually teaches you VHDL fundamentals by practising with the Digilent Spartan-3 board (or any similar Spartan board).

Author starts with basic combinational circuits (comparators, etc) and then moves into sequential and more advanced topics - Even a picoblaze chapter is included. You learn why the examples have been written in that way, possible caveats and solutions. Then you have some proposed exercises to help you master the topic. All this with a very good style and good attention to the details.

A *must have*.