I wish I had more free time and more skills on PCB designing as when the best fpga-board ever is the one you design by yourself
In my case it looks to papilio/pro, but with double fpga since one needs to be dedicated as sram-controller(1) to be used as VideoRam (suitable for framebuffer applications) and System ram (suitable for softcore applications), a couple of NVRAM static ram (or FeRam?), more SRAM (I don't like ddr, and 32MB of ram is fine, I don't need more ram anyway), a Cypress EZ-USB FX2 fast link, and a XC9572XL (5V tollerant) cpld.
The sram controller needs a lot of time constraints and a clock of no less than 99Mhz, thus it needs the DCM module to triplicate the crystal clock (33Mhz on Papilo/Pro), and all of these are critical path design unless you want to use IP-parts by Xilinx. Not so complex, it can be done, but they are a black-box piece of code, thus I prefer to embed them into a dedicated fpga and model the whole chip in ModelSim as "black box chip" which offers an interface with a precise behavior!
All of these, anyway, if it's made like a "PDA-shaped board" it for sure requires a clever pcb-design, especially if small size (high density).
It's definitively a no-go for EagleCAD and I am afraid it requires something more powerful like Altium, which I am trying to learn ... but the learning curve is ... like a rocket to reach Mars!
Soon or later ... I hope I will make it.
Spartan 6 FPGA Board with EZ-USB FX2 (no SDRAM)
Spartan 6 FPGA Board with EZ-USB FX2 and DDR SDRAM
In the meanwhile I am fine with
this board. It's perfect for my for my softcore project; it offers all I need (even if ... the SRAM controller as well as the PLL in the DCM module are both inside the whole vhdl design and this gives me some problem since I can't simulate them in a comfortable way and I needed to create to profiles "synthesis" and "simulation" in order to include/exclude IP-driven files). It also offers 100 GPIO on two comfortable header connectors on the back of the board, and 37 GPIO between the fpga and the FX2 chip to implement a super fast usb-link (which is marvelous if you aim for uploading/downloading stuff as fast as you can: 20Mbyte/sec reached!!!)
There are also at least three methods to bootstrap the fpga: -1- from the jtag (you need an external jtax-cable) -2- from the SPI-flash and -3- from the FX chip!
WOOOOOW
All good feedbacks from me, no doubt it's my best purchase ever
Just mind the gap between this board and others: it's a largely expensive board, something like ~160 euro once VAT and postage applied
1 x USB-FPGA Module 2.04b (XC6SLX16, 64 MB DDR RAM) 119.00EU
Sub-Total: 119.00EUR
Standard Shipping (1-2 weeks): 9.00EUR
Paypal Charges: 1.79EUR
plus 19% VAT: 24.66EUR
=================================
Total: 154.44EUR