From the Editor

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This week, Altera gave us a sneak peek at what they're doing at the 28nm process node.  Why 28nm?  Isn't 32nm supposed to be next?  Since Altera uses TSMC, and TSMC considers 32nm to be an "upgrade" for the current 40/45nm node, all the action like high-K metal gate technology will be at 28nm.  Altera isn't just sitting around waiting for the Moore's Law fairy to drop a 2x package on their doorstep.  They're taking the bull by the horns and throwing in some extra innovation with the goal of hitting about 4x improvement over their 40nm devices.  How are they doing it?  Our latest feature has the details.

Thanks as always for reading. We encourage you to share your thoughts in the new easier-to-use comments area right below the articles; don’t be shy. Or you can get a lively discussion going on our new FORUMS. You may have noticed a reward for the best, most insightful posts, so go to it!

Kevin Morris - Editor, FPGA Journal


Industry News

February 08, 2010

Xilinx at Mobile World Congress 2010

APAC IC adopts Synopsys Galaxy Custom Designer solution to meet growing analogue/mixed-signal IC design service demand

Low Power Isolated Monolithic Flyback Switching Regulator Simplifies Design & Eliminates Optocoupler

GateRocket Highlights New FPGA Debug Solutions at DVCon

SiliconBlue Unveils New Members of the iCE65 mobileFPGA Family at Mobile World Congress

February 05, 2010

Lattice Semiconductor Selects Microsoft Dynamics AX to Improve Supply-Chain Efficiency

CommAgility Announces Complete PHY And MAC Card For LTE Or WIMAX

February 04, 2010

15V, 4MHz, Synchronous 2.5A Step-Down Regulator in a 3mm x 3mm QFN

February 03, 2010

RF Engines Ltd (RFEL) launches highly configurable, multichannel RF signal generator

Synopsys Acquires VaST Systems Technology Corporation

The Best of Both Worlds: Altium Adds High-Performance, Low-cost Option to Its NanoBoard 3000 Range

SiSoft Announces Multiple Design Kits for Quantum Channel Designer (QCD) Serial Link Analysis Software Enabling Simulation Speeds 1000 Times Faster than Traditional Simulation Methodologies

February 02, 2010

LeCroy Introduces ProtoSync® PE -- Synchronized and Simultaneous Views of Physical Layer Signals with LeCroy PETracer Protocol and BitTracer Views

New Company, Gigamax Technologies, Introduces Industry’s First 12.5GHz Oscilloscope-Based Serial Data Management System for Under $30k

High Voltage, Low Quiescent Current Synchronous Step-Down DC/DC Controller Operates from -55°C to 125°C

SiSoft and Xilinx Demonstrate Virtex6® IBIS-AMI SerDes Simulation Models, Hardware/Software Correlation at DesignCon 2010

February 01, 2010

Altera Unveils Innovations for 28-nm FPGAs

Lattice Semiconductor And eVision Systems GmbH To Serve The Video & Surveillance Market

45V Input 100mA LDO Offers 30µVRMS Noise & Output Down to 0.6V

January 28, 2010

QuickLogic CSSPs Shipping in Option Wireless’ 14.4Mbps 3G USB Modems with MicroSD Support

Feature Articles

Changes in the Wind

Altera Shows 28nm Plans

by Kevin Morris

We like our pictures.

We like them to move and we like them to be sharp.

We also want them in our pockets.

Delivering high-quality video to mobile devices is truly a system-wide endeavor. Every link of the chain - from the heavy-iron infrastructure to the wireless access points to the mobile devices themselves require a major upgrade in bandwidth, compute performance, quality of service, and power efficiency. If you take your favorite market forecast and a spreadsheet, you can start with the number of subscribers and do the math back through the system - and come up with some sobering figures for bandwidth at every level. Today's 40G/100G challenges become tomorrows 400G challenges – and, with specifications and standards guaranteed to be in flux, this spells a big opportunity for programmable logic devices.  Read More

Fending Off Evil

Protecting Your FPGA Against DPA

by Kevin Morris

A Perfect DSP Storm

BDTi + High Level Synthesis + FPGA

by Kevin Morris

From Pinout to Layout:

The FPGA/PCB Balancing Act

by Daniel Platzker and Paolo Spazzini, Mentor Graphics Corporation

FPGAs and the New IP Economy

Micro-scale Hardware as a Service

by Kevin Morris

Timing Closure Methodology for Advanced FPGA Designs

by Ramaprasad Kowshika, Altera Corporation


A Mighty Wind of Programmability

Moshe and Krishna Talk About Xilinx, FPGAs, and the Future

by Kevin Morris

Managing Mental Myopia

Avoiding Single-issue Engineering

by Kevin Morris

Paint-by-number ASSP

Xilinx Releases Targeted Design Platforms

by Kevin Morris

Dawn of a New Day

SiliconBlue Shipping in Volume

by Kevin Morris


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