Xilinx Expands Digital Communication Design Solutions With New And Enhanced IP Cores For Virtex-II Platform FPGAS

Solution Includes New Digital Down Converter And CORDIC LogiCORE Modules

SAN JOSE, CA--(INTERNET WIRE)--Apr 10, 2002 -- Xilinx, Inc. , today announced the immediate availability of 22 new and enhanced LogiCORE(TM) products for use with its Virtex-II(TM) family of FPGAs. New cores in the release include a Digital Down Converter (DDC), a CORDIC, a Multiply-Accumulate-based Finite Impulse Response (MAC FIR) Filter, a High-Performance 64-, 256-, 1024-point Complex Fast Fourier Transform (FFT)/Inverse FFT and a 2-D Discrete Cosine Transform (DCT). Several enhanced cores in the release include a Reed-Solomon Encoder and Decoder, a Convolutional Encoder, a General Purpose Viterbi Decoder, and an Interleaver/De-interleaver. When used with Xilinx"s extensive library of existing IP, these new and enhanced parameterizable cores help digital signal processing (DSP) designers to build highly configurable systems for wireless and wireline communication systems.

"With the release of the highly configurable DDC, Xilinx is adding value to our customers by providing more complex IP for our Virtex-II Platform FPGAs," said David Squires, director of the Xilinx DSP Center of Excellence. "The quality of the enhanced Direct Digital Synthesizer (DDS) exceeds anything that"s available today for configurable logic. It"s large dynamic range of 115dB, makes it ideal for use in digital transmitters and receivers."

The newly released DDC and CORDIC cores enable the construction of high-performance channelizers for software defined radios in CMDA2000 and 3G basestations. The cores are also used in digital receivers, cable modems, QAM modulators and demodulators, and spread spectrum communication systems. The DDC module has a configurable data path that includes a mixer, a DDS, a Cascaded Integrator Comb (CIC) Filter, and two polyphase multirate filters that support adjustment of the system sample rate and matched filtering. In additional to being a key building block for DSP designers, the highly configurable core is an ideal alternative to fixed function DDC application specific standard products (ASSPs).

The release also includes a new MAC-based FIR core for adjusting the sample rate in a system, and for pulse shaping and matched filtering in modulators and demodulators respectively. In addition to being highly configurable, this core allows users to realize the multiply operators using the FPGA logic fabric or by taking advantage of the dedicated multipliers embedded in the Virtex-II series silicon. The High-Performance 64-, 256-, 1024-point Complex FFT/IFFT core is ideal for wireless and wireline system designers to build orthogonal frequency division multiplexed (OFDM) modulators and demodulators, and spread spectrum management systems.

The IP release also includes several enhanced forward error correction (FEC) LogiCORE modules including a Reed-Solomon Encoder and Decoder, a Convolutional Encoder, a Viterbi Decoder, and an Interleaver/De-interleaver. These cores are often used together to create highly flexible concatenated coding systems for the digital communication market. The enhanced Reed-Solomon (RS) Decoder now supports higher bit rates with a minimal increase in area. The General Purpose Viterbi Decoder is compatible with many common standards such as DVB ETS, 3GPP2, Hiperlan, and Intelsat IESS-308/309. The core has been optimized to support dual code rates, allowing a single decoder to decode two sets of data. The FEC offering also includes an Interleaver/De-interleaver that has been enhanced to support rectangular block interleaving functions, in addition to the already available convolution interleaving/de-interleaving functions.

License price and availability

All the LogiCORE products in this release are available immediately under the terms of the SignOnce IP license and are downloadable over the web at www.xilinx.com/dsp. The majority of the cores in this release are included with the latest version of the Xilinx CORE Generator(TM) System. However, some of the cores are licensed separately. The General Purpose Viterbi Decoder is licensed as a parameterizable netlist for $5,000. The Reed-Solomon Decoder and Encoder are $5,000 and $500 respectively, and the Interleaver/De-interleaver is $1,000. All the cores in this release support the latest Spartan(TM)-II, Spartan-(TM)IIE, Virtex-II(TM), and Virtex-II Pro(TM) FPGAs and the latest ISE 4.2i version of the Xilinx design software.

About Xilinx

Xilinx is the leading supplier of complete programmable logic solutions, including advanced integrated circuits, software design tools, predefined system functions delivered as intellectual property cores, and unparalleled field engineering support. Founded in 1984 and headquartered in San Jose, Calif., Xilinx invented the field programmable gate array (FPGA) and fulfills more than half of the world demand for these devices today. Xilinx solutions enable customers to reduce significantly the time required to develop products for the computer, peripheral, telecommunications, networking, industrial control, instrumentation, high-reliability/military, low-power portable and consumer markets. For more information, visit the Xilinx website at www.xilinx.com.