What is the new Xilinx Spartan III device like?

[Bartart]

Spartan III

Hi!

Yesterday when I was doing some stuff in ISE 5.1 corgenerator and I saw a new device tab with a unexpected title Spartan 3, as shown in pic.

Does anyone know about this new xilinx device?

 

[Ace-X]

Yes. I had a talk with guys from Xilinx on the Electronica 2002 exhibition in Munich. In some words, Spartan III is a cheap version of Virtex II (in the same way as Spartan2 is a cheap version of Virtex).
They will start with production in the first half of 2003 with 0.9 and 0.65 um process. As far as I remember, they told that the biggest part will be 3S2000.

Ace-X.

 

[Bartart]

Hello!

Thanks for the info, it is nice to hear that, I was on the xilinx seminar in March and thay had allready spoken about the new low cost device.

Bart

 

[leonqin]

Yes. I had a talk with guys from Xilinx on the Electronica 2002 exhibition in Munich. In some words, Spartan III is a cheap version of Virtex II (in the same way as Spartan2 is a cheap version of Virtex).
They will start with production in the first half of 2003 with 0.9 and 0.65 um process. As far as I remember, they told that the biggest part will be 3S2000.

Ace-X.

0.65um???

 

[Ace-X]

I also was wondering about .65 um.
Unfortunately, these guys on exhibition were just from the manager stuff, so they know near nothing about technical details. Looks like this technology will be used only in future to produce S3 parts.

Ace-X

P.S. BTW, following the Xilinx strategy the next generation after Spartan3 will be Spartan3 Pro as a cheap substitution of Virtex2Pro. It will have integrated 8-bit microprocessor (in contrary to PowerPC in V2Pro) and 10-Mbit Rocket I/O (as a substitution of 3.125 Gbps in V2Pro). Of course, it is just a joke!

 

[ch_wen]

It is 90nm process!!!

It is 90nm process as I know.

 

[it_boy]

Does anybody have the latest news about the release of Spartan-III?
Has it been released in the market yet?

 

[Bartart]

Hello!

No, Spartan III is not yet on the market.

The date I have is May 03.

Some info about S3:

smallest device XC3S50 50k gate
largest XC3S2000 2Mio gate

The core will work on 1.2V, IOs will support from 1.2V to 2.5V standards
Available package TQ144, PQ208, FT256, FG456, FG676, FG900

Prices are still unknown.

Bart

 

[it_boy]

Thanks for the quick update Bartart.
Any link for more details about this?

 

[tlp71@hotmail.com]

spartan III is the low cost family of VirtexII?
In Xilinx site ther is this inforamtion?

Thank.
G.

 

[Bartart]

Hi!

I think the best way to know something more about it is to downlaod WebPack 5.2 that support it and I am sure that it has some DS inside.

Good luck

Bart

 

[ch_wen]

Spartan III is derived from Virtex-II but cut some features for the low cost reason. :roll:

 

[leonqin]

I have done some projects with Cyclone but where is SpartranIII now?

 

[abba]

spartan III

does any development boards exist on the market?

 

[Bartart]

Hi!


look @

**broken link removed**

Bart

 

[take_care11]

spartan III

Spartan III is the low price version of virtex II but it is geared to a different market.

Virtex II is geared to high-end applications that need embeded microprocessor and high speed communication. Spartan II is targeted to cost-sensitive applications that don't need microprocessors (as the PowerPC in the Virtex II family).

take care

 

[it_boy]

Hi take_care11,

Virtex II family does not contain PPC, I think you meant Virtex-II Pro

 

[tlp71@hotmail.com]

a big trouble whit spIII is that this device can drive hard the 3.3V, in fact the i/o was made to drive 2.5V.
I now that xilinx was correct this feature but for now there is a hgigh probability to carsh the device if we drive a 3.3V.

Bye
G.