Zynq 7020 or 7030 for my project?

[HasanSyr]

For my graduation project this semester, I'm creating an FPGA dev board focused on stereocamera depth calculation/ML acceleration for robotics applications. I have chosen Zynq 7000 since I'm not experienced with FPGAs and it has a lot of documentation, public dev board schematics, etc...

I'm considering either using 7020 which costs ~27 or a 7030 which costs ~60. I plan to use this FPGA board for general stuff other than depth calculation/ML. Since I'll order the PCB from JLCPCB I'll have to buy 2 FPGAs since that's the minimum assembly amount.

My university will be paying ~350$, by my early estimates if I get the 7020's I wouldn't have to pay, but if I use the 7030 I'll pay about 100$ (there is a chance my university will go over budget).

Another thing I'm questioning is whether or not this project is feasible, especially since I have until the end of the semester. This would be the 3rd PCB I ever designed. The most complex PCB I have designed is an STM32 Bluetooth dev board which involved some impedance stuff for the antenna. I might try to get the FPGA board done and If I couldn't I'll just make some version of the STM32 Dev Board I already made.

[moffy]

That is a very short timescale for a completely new design and board, especially for something you are unfamiliar with. Going straight from a complex new design to a working board without allowing time for a prototype to debug the inevitable issues is not a good practice. I once applied for a job for a laser printer design/manufacturer and they had the expectation that I would go straight from design to manufacturing without prototyping, I declined the position. It wasn't long until I heard they were out of business, not a suprise.

[langwadt]

much more realistic to get something like this https://www.myirtech.com/list.asp?id=708 and make  "motherboard" for it

[coromonadalix]

same  here  since covid   Zynq series prices has gone thru the roof ...  the 30 and 45 ...    we managed to find some at 180$ usd / piece

Now, we use the Myir  boards and designed a carrier for them,  lan  rs485   etc ...   works very well ...  we have more rom / ram, they can customize ...

theses series :  https://www.myirtech.com/list.asp?id=694


designing from scratch in a short timeline, as other wrote  is not  viable  ....       
even  with the Myir boards, it took us 10 months to iron out bugs in the carrier design,  usb interface, sd card, emmc storage, gpio's,  esd protections, temperature, vibrations, trace lenghts / impedance matching ... etc ...

it is an industrial use we have for it ...   it runs Petalinux and FW goes thru Vivado  who's a big piece of ....  gigs

oh  and 25 of theses  carriers and cpu board cost us around 1K$ /ea   for a 12 layers,   15x 15 cm

Next one will be  in the Artix series or more powerful,  but price a 10x times more ..... well see


@op    you surely can find dev board as linked, it would be a matter of building your os fork / features  etc ....
thoses z-turn board series seems good,  seems to have  the raspi sizes / foot print

good luck

[RoGeorge]

The project is not realistic if one is not already very familiar with FPGA.  In my experience, the hardware design and the PCB, while far from trivial when an FPGA is involved, are minor time sinks when compared with FPGA programming/learning curve.

For a one semester time frame and, unless an FPGA is mandatory, I would rather choose a microcontroller only implementation, and no FPGA.

[HasanSyr]

The project is not realistic if one is not already very familiar with FPGA.  In my experience, the hardware design and the PCB, while far from trivial when an FPGA is involved, are minor time sinks when compared with FPGA programming/learning curve.

For a one semester time frame and ubless an FPGA is mandatory, I would rather choose a microcontroller only implementation, and no FPGA.

My thinking was using a lot of the publicly available schematics of other boards for the harder parts or if I get stuck somewhere and that I might get someone to review my work.

[tom66]

The board layout alone for 7020 is going to take a long time. I laid out a 7020 board and it took about 4 weeks of evenings and weekends.  If you only did that every day maybe you could get it done in 2 weeks.  But it will be a challenge for sure, especially if you have never laid out a board before.  You will also need to lay out things like SMPS, or if you have DDR memory then that is a lot more complexity too. Also you will need to get the board manufactured, which can be expensive, make sure that has been accounted for in your costs.

[RoGeorge]

Maybe get yourself a ready made Zynq devboard at first, there are a few rather cheap.

Or maybe buy some open source product that has an FPGA inside (for example an ADALM-PLUTO SDR https://www.analog.com/en/resources/evaluation-hardware-and-software/evaluation-boards-kits/adalm-pluto.html , such that at the end of the day you'll still have a useful SDR up to 6GHz, even if you drop the project).

Try to reprogram that to do some other things you wish, to see how it is when working with an FPGA.  It's way more difficult and laborious than working with MCUs.

[HasanSyr]

Maybe get yourself a ready made Zynq devboard at first, there are a few rather cheap.

Or maybe buy some open source product that has an FPGA inside (for example an ADALM-PLUTO SDR https://www.analog.com/en/resources/evaluation-hardware-and-software/evaluation-boards-kits/adalm-pluto.html , such that at the end of the day you'll still have a useful SDR up to 6GHz, even if you drop the project).

Try to reprogram that to do some other things you wish, to see how it is when working with an FPGA.  It's way more difficult and laborious than working with MCUs.

I think I'm going to get the MYD-C7Z010/20-V2 Development Board to look at its design and familiarize myself with FPGAs. Then (presumably) remove the carrier card and design my own dev board around it.

[RoGeorge]

Sounds like a good plan. 
Can not comment about the devboard model, I don't know it, but the specs seem OK for the price.

[tom66]

I used MYIR Z-turn Lite dev kit, no problems at all, very fairly priced too.

[Postal2]

Search EBAZ4205, must be about 15$.
https://aliexpress.com/item/1005005919123170.html

[coromonadalix]

oh ho   good  find on this one,   hope  @ op see this