Gadget Factory

FPGA

  • NTSC Battleship – NTSC generation using VGA DAC

    Here is an interesting project coming out of a Cornell University Engineering class. Two students tackled the challenge of generating color NTSC signals using the DE2 FPGA development board. What’s interesting is they used the 10 bit VGA DAC to generate multiple NTSC signals. They were able to re-purpose the Analog Devices ADV7123 Video DAC…

  • HowTo: Papilio Loader GUI on Linux

    The Papilio Loader Java GUI now runs on Linux. See how to install and run for yourself, this tutorial is for Ubuntu Linux. Download the Linux tar file from Gadget Factory download section and extract to your directory of choice. Ensure that libftdi-dev and the Java SDK is installed. In ubuntu do the following command:…

  • A free version of Microblaze Soft Processor available in Coregen!

    Ever wanted to check out Xilinx’s premier Microblaze Soft Processor but the $500 EDK license was too pricey? Well, Magnus Karlsson pointed out that there is a free lightweight version of Microblaze, called Microblaze MCS, available in ISE’s Coregen wizard. Even better, here is a tutorial showing how to get up and running with it!…

  • Accelerometer Tilt Sensing On Altera DE0 Nano FPGA

    We found a great tutorial for using an accelerometer’s tilt data on an FPGA over at Pyro Electro. In this particular project, they’re using an Altera DE0-Nano board (and using the built-in accelerometer), a breadboard, the DE0-Nano Development Suite software, (32x) 100 mega resistors, (32x) green LEDs, and jumper wires. Check out the video above,…

  • ZX Spectrum ULA Chip Implementation On OBLS

    Above: OpenBench Logic Sniffer running the ZX Spectrum ULA chip clone. As a follow-up to Friday’s article on the ZX Spectrum clone running on the Pipistrello, I thought it would be good to share a little more with you on the implementation of the Sinclair ULA chip. The chip was originally included in the ZX…

  • ZX Spectrum With HDMI Out On The Pipistrello

    Jozsef Laszlo, AKA “joco” has come up with a very good implementation of the 1982 ZX Spectrum computer using his Papilio-based Pipistrello board. Joco says he wanted to do the ZX Spectrum project to “prove that a Spectrum clone can have a modern HDMI video output. Pipistrello was a good choice for this, because it…

  • An Interesting Take On FPGAs From A R-Pi Point Of View

    From Raspberry Pi @ Gadgetoid comes an interesting overview on FPGAs – in particular, our flagship Papilio-series dev boards. It’s refreshing to read Phillip Howard’s angle on all this, as it is decidedly from an Arduino/ Raspberry Pi angle on things. The article is a well-written synopsis and can serve its purpose well for those…

  • Chess-Playing FPGAs @ Design West 2014

    Warren Miller of All Programmable Planet has a plan to turn his research and writings about teaching an FPGA to play chess into a real thing – at next year’s Design West event. His plan is to have “an extravaganza at Design West 2014 in which electronic “Robot” chess players can compete on the big…