FPGA is specific device that packs lots of power when used properly. They aren’t meant for general purpose use, but rather to do more specialized high resource demanding tasks like image, signal processing. If you see real potential of FPGA then give it a try. If you look for small and affordable FPGA development board – miniSpartan6 might fit your starting needs.

It is built using Spartan 6 FPGA chip from Xlink. Board comes with JTAG programmer which uses FT2232D chip for USB connection. Also you will find 32MB of RAM and 8MB of SPI flash memory. There are 36 programmable I/Os where already 8 LEDs and 4 DIP switches are connected for fast start.

We believe such task can be made by any tiny microcontroller. But if there is a lazy FPGA board lying around then put it to work. And here it is – Cyclone II dev board makes sure coil gets right amount of windings. New coil carcase is fixed to motor. FPGA reads each motor turn using reed switch.

Simple HDL program runs counter and displays current value on seven segment LED display found on board. There is probably one thing missing – motor control that would stop once number of windings is reached. Anyway this is not for mass production of coils and project example may serve as nice material for learning FPGAs.

What does it take to measure frequency up to 100MHz. The answer is FPGA. Mike wanted to make pretty accurate frequency counter so grabbed Papilio FPGA board, attached TM1638 display board from DE and referenced frequency with GPS module. It works without GPS module but looses accuracy since these modules may give 1PPS with accuracy down to 20ns.

FPGA world is interesting and if want to peak in – you need proper development board to start with. Saanlima Electronics designed pretty decent development that has lots of features so you won’t have to look for some time.

The heard of development board is FPGA Spartan-6 that comes in 324 BGA package. Among features on board there are 64MBytes of DRAM clocked at 200MHz, 2 channel USB through FTDI2232H, DBI/HDMI interface. Also there is a micro-SD socket, USB host interface, several LED indicators and 48 I/O pins broken out in Papilio style.