Hi.
I'm looking at learning about FPGA boards and the MKRVIDOR4000 seems ideal. I looked at the Amazon reviews in passing and they seem to be saying it's not for beginners. Is it OK to learn FPGA programming on or do you need to know quite a lot to start?
Bipman
Not an "installation and troubleshooting" question. Please take care which forum section you choose, there are warnings posted. I will move your topic.
Whoops sorry.
There is a good bit of a learning curve but I believe that to be true of any FPGA.
It's not exactly the same way as with "any FPGA".
Generally with "any FPGA devkit" you have a full control of FPGA and everything attached to it. Typically this means you have the direct JTAG connection to FPGA and you have vendor tools working almost seamlessly with attached flash chip to store configuration stream and user data.
Now the Vidor4K takes away that freedom, instead providing convenience for Arduino users that would rather use the FPGA with third-party "configuration stream library". You do not have a direct access to FPGA unless you solder JTAG connector and make sure to keep the MCU in reset/bootloader state to avoid contention on JTAG lines when you're using that route. The flash chip must have special bootloader configuration that sits there to provide integration with Arduino ecosystem. It's expected you convert the FPGA configuration image into source-level file that is included in your Arduino sketch, and the FPGA's "bootloader" configuration flashes that stream in chip when you upload the sketch from the Arduino IDE.
Authors provide a sketch that emulates the USB Blaster, this makes it look like you do have a direct connection to FPGA with "real" USB Blaster, but that emulation is not complete, you do not get access to flash chip using Altera/Intel's "factory default SFL image", and it replaces your Arduino sketch, so no MCU programs while using this emulator.
So yes, while Vidor4K is friendly to Arduino users that do not specialize in FPGA development, the hardcore FPGA users will find it somewhat inconvenient compared to other devkits. You must learn a unique setup inherent to Vidor4K, and this knowledge will not be needed anywhere else. This setup will get in a way on more than one occasion, while "any other FPGA" experience without such convoluted setup is quite similar across a variety of vendors and systems.
Thanks for the info everyone
Bipman
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