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programmablelogicZONE Products for the week of October 27, 2008
Actel Corporation Says…
New Ground Broken With nanoPOWER and nanoSIZE FPGAs
Actel IGLOO and ProASIC3 nano FPGAs target global portable and consumer customers
Extending its position as the leading provider of low-power programmable logic, Actel Corporation has introduced nano versions of its IGLOO and ProASIC3 FPGAs, targeted at the high-volume, portable consumer market. Actel takes power consumption down to as low as 2 microwatts (2 µW), and package size to as small as 3x3mm; extends its commercial temperature range to sub-zero, and offers zero lead time delivery of packaged goods. Actel also shatters the FPGA price barrier by offering over 50 variants of its nano FPGAs for less than $1.
“We are breaking new ground and taking FPGAs to a whole new space,” John East, the company’s CEO declared. “While other FPGA suppliers have been eyeing this market, only Actel has the unique ability to immediately address the design requirements of the rapidly burgeoning portable, consumer market. As those markets move at warp speed, we have built a strategic inventory position, which will allow us to offer delivery of the right product mix for customers that need large volumes of a competitive product in the market immediately.”
The company is also offering support for known good die business to meet the lead times and volume demands of portable applications, such as smart phones, PDAs, personal medical monitoring devices, personal navigation devices, eBooks, and portable point of sale tools, demand.
nanoPower, nanoSize and nanoTemp
With power consumption as low as 2 microwatts (2µW), IGLOO nano FPGAs range in densities from 10k to 250k system gates. These devices support 1.2V to 1.5V core and I/O operation, ultra-low-power Flash*Freeze mode with bus hold capability, as well as advanced I/O features, such as hot swapping and Schmitt trigger inputs.
Achieving a significant milestone for the industry, Actel will offer its low-power IGLOO nano FPGAs in a 3x3mm package, the smallest package for any programmable logic device on the market. Complementing its existing portfolio of small 4x4mm, 5x5mm, 6x6mm and 8x8mm packages, the new tiny package makes IGLOO nano FPGAs an even more compelling choice for power-sensitive, space-constrained handheld devices.
The company is also enhancing its standard commercial ambient operating temperatures, offering new ranges for IGLOO nano FPGAs from -20°C to +70°C, allowing many of these portable applications to be operated in sub-zero environments around the world.
nanoLead Time
Both IGLOO nano and ProASIC3 nano FPGAs, in densities of 60k, 125k and 250k gates, are immediately available in volume with zero lead times. Additional densities will be available in volume in early 2009. Customers also have immediate access to known good die, offering size and cost benefits as well as design integration advantages.
Comprehensive Tool Support
Support for IGLOO and ProASIC3 nano FPGAs is available now in Actel’s Libero Integrated Design Environment (IDE) v8.4. This power-optimized development environment enables power-driven layout, battery estimation and advanced power analysis.
For immediate prototyping and programming, designers can leverage the Actel IGLOO Icicle Kit immediately available for $99. The 1.4” x 3.6” kit features ultra low-power attributes, flexible implementation options and battery-saving advantages of the company’s standard low-power IGLOO FPGA for portable applications. The kit also enables designers to easily and rapidly program, evaluate and modify their IGLOO-based portable designs.
In November, Actel plans to offer a low-cost nano starter kit, priced at $49.95 and fitted with an IGLOO AGLN250 in a VQG100 package. With multiple voltage levels provided, this board allows quick prototyping and access to all I/O pins and can demonstrate Flash*Freeze mode control and enable battery operation.
EN-Genius Says…
While Brand X and the other Brand A have been slugging it out for dominance in the high-end FPGA market, Actel has been hard at work coming up with a winning strategy to expand its share of the much less glamorous, but potentially very lucrative, market for very small, power-efficient, and moderately fast programmable devices. By offering nano-ized (Actel’s term, not mine) versions of their ProASIC3 and IGLOO product lines that consume less power, less space, and give designers a wider spectrum of choices in sub-$1 FPGAs, they have made FPGAs an even more compelling option for high-volume consumer and automotive electronic products. In fact, they now offer 50 parts that cost under a buck when you by them in production volumes. Surprisingly, their new extended temperature range (-20C to +70C) makes some of these versatile parts a great choice for under-the-hood automotive applications as well.
Actel’s nano moniker refers to a constellation of improvements they’ve made to their IGLOO and ProASIC3 product lines to make them more attractive for applications where every microwatt and every penny count. The release above covers most of the improvements so I’ll just cover a few highlights here.
Low power operation has always been one of the hallmarks of Actel products so it’s no surprise that these new parts have several improvements that make them even more efficient. Although their power-frugal IGLOO series had already been ruthlessly scrubbed for unnecessary parasitic and static power losses, Actel designers used a second round of simulation to tweak the architecture a bit more and yield further reductions in static power by as much as 40%. Equally impressive, they were able to do it without compromising the logic clock speed (typical IGLOO designs run at 75 MHz - 80 MHz at 1.5 V and around 50 MHz at 1.2 V.). Their power-saving Flash*Freeze mode has also been improved so that in addition to preserving the state of the internal logic while in sleep mode it now also holds the I/O pins in the state they were set in when it was powered-down. This allows a sleeping device to remain connected to a bus without consequence. Speaking of I/O, the Schmidt triggers Actel has added to its input pins will be very handy for anyone trying to deal with noisy logic signals: something that is encountered frequently in the confined spaces of handheld devices and other consumer equipment.
Since the nano family is targeted specifically at high-volume applications, Actel was very wise to provide a wider range of options at the lower end of their product families so that designers can buy just the right amount of gates and I/O that they need for their application. You can now get a ProASIC with as few as 10 k gates (the smallest earlier device had 15 k) and step up to15 k, 20 k, 30 k, 50 k, and 60 k devices along the way to the family’s largest 250 k-gate part. Likewise many of the smaller parts are available with different choices of I/O pins allowing for the use of smaller die and smaller packages. In many designs, the space savings this yields will be as important as the nickel or dime it knocks off your product BOM.
Although it’s not an engineering feature per se, Actel’s decision to keep large quantities of selected package options is another indicator that they’ve geared up to play in the rough-and-tumble world of consumer electronics where manufacturers have to turn production on quickly to meet customer deadlines. Other package options that are not available with zero-week lead times can be delivered quickly from the wafers Actel will keep in stock. It also means that customers interested in known-good bare die will be assured of having devices when they need them.
In high volume, pricing for the 10 k-gate A3PN010 starts at $0.69 in QNG-48 and $0.49 as known good die. Actel will offer over 50 product variants under $1 for high-volume applications.
Both IGLOO nano and ProASIC3 nano FPGAs, in densities of 60 k, 125 k and 250 k gates, are immediately available in volume with zero lead times. Additional densities will be available in volume in early 2009. Customers also have immediate access to known good die, offering size and cost benefits as well as design integration advantages.
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