FPGA: Getting Started
What we did to make the B5-X come alive.
- We downloaded the Free
Xilinx ISE WebPack tool set. (I have notes on using this product.)
- We tried following the Xilinx tutorial. But that tutorial didn't
do it for me.
- We read Tony Burch's tutorial(s).
(Actually, there are several tutorials, and we had to read them all in
order to put all the pieces together. However, they are very short,
very specific, and after all is said and done, the most useful
tutorials we found on the web.)
- We followed the directions and downloaded the Heartbeat.vhd file
and the ChipHeartbeat.vhd file. Then we made the ChipHeartbeat.ucf
file (again, following the instructions). Last, we pressed go and
everything just worked. :-)
- My dad gave me guidance on building a speaker to connect to the
FPGA. You can read about that here.
- We bought lots of books and read some of them. You can read
about that here.