RE: Is is possible to receive a cheep SubVendorID?

[Duane Clark <dclark@akamail.com>]

Wow, I don't think I have seen this much traffic on pci-sig in a long
time.

Dave wrote,
> As far as what can be done with CPLD's I'm waiting
> to hear from someone that has actually implemented
> a completely PCI-specification (electrical, logical,
> and timing) compliant interface in these things.
> If you have, and you are willing to share all that
> you have learned, then I'm sure a lot of folks
> would be interested in hearing about it.
> 
> Cheers,
> 
> -- DaveN

While I agree that it would be intellectually interesting to see a truly
compliant PCI interface in a CPLD, I think that recent developments have
made that almost a moot point. The latest Xilinx devices (Spartan II)
can do fully compliant mastering, and at a price of $15-20 in individual
quantities. And the tools, while still moderately expensive, have
definitely come way down in price to a point where $2500 is definitely
not lost in the noise. Several vendors are offering stripped down
versions of their tools for free or very cheap, that still appear
capable of being used for PCI design (I have not tried them though - I
use the $ versions).

To really go off on a tangent, I have been especially amazed at the
pattern in VHDL simulators for Linux. One of the first that came out
that I am aware of was Modelsim, but at a strangulation inducing $20K.
Since then, a new one has been announced every few months, with each one
cheaper than the last. The latest that I have seen, from Green Mountain
Computing, is $800, though I have no idea of the quality of it. Now if
we could only get a synthesis tool for Linux! Fortunately, the Xilinx
implementation tools run just fine under Linux.

I think that all this is actually good in a way. I started out in
electronics when a dedicated hobbiest could get the parts and build
equipment that was pretty close to standard commercial art. They got
left behind when ASICs made extraordinary sophistication available to
those with a very large bank account. Now finally an amazing amount of
power is once again available to the little guy, even college students
on very restricted budgets. I think that this will provide an
opportunity for creativity that will be healthy for the industry in
general. I also think that a publicly available free PCI compliant
interface for FPGAs is not all that far away:-)

Duane