Intel® Quartus® Prime Pro Edition User Guide: Platform Designer

ID 683609
Date 6/20/2022
Public

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2.2. Platform Designer Interface Support

Platform Designer is most effective when you use standard interfaces available in the IP Catalog to design custom IP. Standard interfaces operate efficiently with Intel FPGA IP components, and you can take advantage of the bus functional models (BFMs), monitors, and other verification IP that the IP Catalog provides.

Platform Designer also supports connections between Avalon® and AXI interfaces by generating the interconnect logic. This logic enables you to handle the protocol difference. Platform Designer creates the interconnect logic by converting all the protocols to a proprietary packet format. Then, the tool routes the packet through network switches to the appropriate agents. Here, the packet converts to the agent's protocol.

Platform Designer supports the following interface specifications:

  • Intel FPGA Avalon® Memory-Mapped and Streaming
  • Arm* AMBA* 3 AXI (version 1.0)
  • Arm* AMBA* 4 AXI (version 2.0)
  • Arm* AMBA* 4 AXI-Lite (version 2.0)
  • Arm* AMBA* 4 AXI-Stream (version 1.0)
  • Arm* AMBA* 3 APB (version 1.0)

IP components (IP Cores) can have any number of interfaces in any combination. Each interface represents a set of signals that you can connect within a Platform Designer system, or export outside of a Platform Designer system.

Platform Designer IP components can include the following interface types:

Table 1.  IP Component Interface Types
Interface Type Description

Memory-Mapped

Connects memory-referencing host devices with agent memory devices. Host devices can be processors and DMAs, while agent memory devices can be RAMs, ROMs, and control registers. Data transfers between Avalon® Memory Mapped host and agent may be uni-directional (read only or write only), or bi-directional (read and write).

Streaming

Connects Avalon® Streaming sources and sinks that stream unidirectional data, as well as high-bandwidth, low-latency IP components. Streaming creates datapaths for unidirectional traffic, including multichannel streams, packets, and DSP data. The Avalon® interconnect is flexible and can implement on-chip interfaces for industry standard telecommunications and data communications cores, such as Ethernet, Interlaken, and video. You can define bus widths, packets, and error conditions.

Interrupts

Connects interrupt senders to interrupt receivers. Platform Designer supports individual, single‑bit interrupt requests (IRQs). In the event that multiple senders assert their IRQs simultaneously, the receiver logic (typically under software control) determines which IRQ has highest priority, then responds appropriately.

Clocks

Connects clock output interfaces with clock input interfaces. Clock outputs can fan-out without the use of a bridge. A bridge is required only when a clock from an external (exported) source connects internally to more than one source.

Resets

Connects reset sources with reset input interfaces. If your system requires a particular positive-edge or negative-edge synchronized reset, Platform Designer inserts a reset controller to create the appropriate reset signal. If you design a system with multiple reset inputs, the reset controller ORs all reset inputs and generates a single reset output.

Conduits

Connects point-to-point conduit interfaces, or represent signals that you export from the Platform Designer system. Platform Designer uses conduits for component I/O signals that are not part of any supported standard interface. You can connect two conduits directly within a Platform Designer system as a point-to-point connection. Alternatively, you can export conduit interfaces and bring the interfaces to the top-level of the system as top-level system I/O. You can use conduits to connect to external devices, for example external DDR SDRAM memory, and to FPGA logic defined outside of the Platform Designer system.

This document now refers to the Avalon® "host" and "agent," and the AXI "manager" and "subordinate," to replace formerly used terms. Refer to the current AMBA AXI and ACE Protocol Specification for the latest AMBA AXI and ACE protocol terminology.