NitAl Announces Immediate Availability of PCI Express Design Kit Based on Xilinx Virtex-II Pro PCI Express Solution

Business Wire, Sept 8, 2004

PORTLAND, Ore. -- NitAl Consulting Services today announced a new PCI Express(TM) Design Kit for developing systems using the Xilinx PCI Express solution. Based on the Xilinx Virtex-II Pro(TM) Platform FPGA, the kit enables architects of high-performance compute, storage and communication systems to immediately deploy the latest PCI Express technology in their designs. NitAl will demonstrate the kit during Intel Developers Forum, Fall 2004, at booth #938.

"PCI Express is well on its way to being the next generation interconnect for desktop as well as the embedded market. Today Xilinx has thousands of licensed PCI designers poised to start designing with PCI Express. As a member of the Xilinx XPERTS Program, NitAl has a wealth of knowledge and experience with PCI Express," said Mark Aaldering, vice president of IP and Embedded Processing Divisions at Xilinx. Mark continues with "FPGA designers now have a design kit specifically designed for using Xilinx PCI Express LogiCORE(TM) in our industry leading platform FPGAs."

About the Design Kit

This kit is immediately available and features a hardware evaluation board based on the state-of-the-art Virtex-II Pro (2VP40) device and a host of functions including: up to eight 3.125 Gbps Xilinx RocketIO(TM) multi-gigabit serial transceivers (MGTs) and 396 LVDS pairs. The board is designed to be used in combination with the Xilinx LogiCORE PCI Express x1 and x4 Endpoint. This design kit is based upon a standard PCI Express form factor allowing the end-user to develop and validate his PCI Express endpoint/switch application with other industry standard PCI Express hardware such as motherboards and adapters as well as NitAl's PCI Express X4 Host emulator-Device Exerciser/Analyzer, PCIeBuilder-H254.

Collaboration with Xilinx

The Design Kit is developed jointly by NitAl and Xilinx. The user can program the PCI Express application RTL into a Xilinx Virtex-II Pro device and immediately begin system validation efforts. The PCIeBuilder-X254 is based on the PCIExBuilder-D251. PCIExBuilder-D251 was used to verify interoperability and the Xilinx PCI Express Endpoint core with industry leading PCI Express Host cards, at the PCI-SIG plugfest.

About the Xilinx PCI Express Core

The Xilinx PCI Express core is protocol and electrically compatible to the v1.0a base PCI Express specification. Designers can utilize the interface to maximize performance and feature quality for high-performance workstations and consumer gaming devices. The core reaches line speeds of up to 2.5 Gbps with single lane (x1) configuration and up to 10 Gbps with four lane (x4) configuration by utilizing the features of the embedded RocketIO multi-gigabit transceivers in the Virtex-II Pro device such as clock data recovery, 8B/10B encoding, 3.125 Gbps SerDes, transmit/receive FIFOs, and CRC. Customers can use the core to design high-performance PCI Express systems using Xilinx Smart-IP(TM) technology to meet critical multi-GHz timing requirements.

About the Xilinx XPERTS Program

Xilinx established the XPERTS Program (www.xilinx.com/xperts) to provide its customers with access to a worldwide network of certified design consultants. XPERTS members are certified and have extensive expertise and experience with Xilinx technology in various vertical applications, such as DSP, communications and networking, video and image processing, system I/O interfaces, and home networking. XPERTS members are an integral part of the Xilinx strategy to provide its customers with cost-efficient design solutions, while speeding time-to-market.

About NitAl Consulting Services Inc.

NitAl introduced its x1 PCIe Exerciser/Analyzer in June 2003 and now offers similar x4 lane products. NitAl offers highest value (Performance to Price Ratio) Bus Analyzer and Packet Generator products for USB2.0, IEEE1394 and PCI Express. NitAl also offers consulting services in high-end FPGA/ASIC design and verification, rapid hardware board prototyping and turnkey solutions including Windows device drivers and embedded system applications. For more information visit http://www.nital.com.

PCI Express(TM) is a trademark of PCI-SIG. Other trademarks that may be mentioned in this document are the intellectual property of the respective owners.