Newsgroups: comp.arch.fpga From: sja@world.std.com (Stuart J Adams) Subject: driving color VGA from FPGA ?? Message-ID: Date: Fri, 22 Dec 2000 13:58:34 GMT Organization: The World Public Access UNIX, Brookline, MA Lines: 16 Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.ifi.unizh.ch!news.imp.ch!uni-erlangen.de!news-nue1.dfn.de!news-lei1.dfn.de!news-was.dfn.de!news-spur1.maxwell.syr.edu!news.maxwell.syr.edu!newsswitch.lcs.mit.edu!world!sja Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch comp.arch.fpga:3464 Anyone know of a nice solution for driving a color VGA display with a FPGA based video controller ?? We want to add VGA output to a product and we happend to have lots of space left in an FPGA on the board. The digital logic is not a problem, the issue is finding a suitable low-cost RAMDAC. Since RAMDACs are no longer used in the mainstream PC industry many are on EOL status and are more expensive than a standalone VGA controller chip. -- Stuart ###### From: acher@in.tum.de (Georg Acher) Newsgroups: comp.arch.fpga Subject: Re: driving color VGA from FPGA ?? Date: 22 Dec 2000 14:20:03 GMT Organization: Technische Universitaet Muenchen, Germany Lines: 25 Sender: acher@atbode61.informatik.tu-muenchen.de (Georg Acher) Distribution: world Message-ID: <91vnuj$q6n$1@sunsystem5.informatik.tu-muenchen.de> References: NNTP-Posting-Host: atbode61.informatik.tu-muenchen.de X-Newsreader: xrn 9.01 Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!newsfeed-zh.ip-plus.net!news.ip-plus.net!news.tesion.net!news.belwue.de!informatik.tu-muenchen.de!atbode61.informatik.tu-muenchen.de!acher Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch comp.arch.fpga:3483 In article , sja@world.std.com (Stuart J Adams) writes: |> Anyone know of a nice solution for |> driving a color VGA display with a |> FPGA based video controller ?? |> |> We want to add VGA output to a product |> and we happend to have lots of space |> left in an FPGA on the board. |> |> The digital logic is not a problem, |> the issue is finding a suitable low-cost |> RAMDAC. Since RAMDACs are no longer used in the |> mainstream PC industry many are on EOL |> status and are more expensive than a |> standalone VGA controller chip. If you are not planning to add a true colour display, you can use simple R/2R networks as DACs (maybe restricted to 4 or 6 bit resolution). If you have plenty of gates left, the RAM should also pose no problem inside the FPGA ;-) -- Georg Acher, acher@in.tum.de http://www.in.tum.de/~acher/ "Oh no, not again !" The bowl of petunias ###### From: Dave Vanden Bout Newsgroups: comp.arch.fpga Subject: Re: driving color VGA from FPGA ?? Date: Fri, 22 Dec 2000 09:29:02 -0500 Organization: XESS Corp. Lines: 23 Message-ID: <3A43652E.EB7AB782@xess.com> References: NNTP-Posting-Host: 3f.32.35.9b Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Server-Date: 22 Dec 2000 14:28:24 GMT X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.75 [en] (Win95; U) X-Accept-Language: en Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.ifi.unizh.ch!news.imp.ch!news-spur1.maxwell.syr.edu!news.maxwell.syr.edu!feed2.onemain.com!feed1.onemain.com!newsfeed2.earthlink.net!newsfeed.earthlink.net!news.mindspring.net!not-for-mail Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch comp.arch.fpga:3505 Stuart J Adams wrote: > Anyone know of a nice solution for > driving a color VGA display with a > FPGA based video controller ?? > > We want to add VGA output to a product > and we happend to have lots of space > left in an FPGA on the board. We have a simple circuit that drives a VGA display from an FPGA. The documentation on the circuit is at http://www.xess.com/appnotes/vga.pdf, and the design files are at http://www.xess.com/projects/vga.zip. -- || Dr. Dave Van den Bout XESS Corp. (919) 387-0076 || || devb@xess.com 2608 Sweetgum Dr. (800) 549-9377 || || http://www.xess.com Apex, NC 27502 USA FAX:(919) 387-1302 || ###### From: Arrigo Benedetti Newsgroups: comp.arch.fpga Subject: Re: driving color VGA from FPGA ?? Date: 22 Dec 2000 12:37:04 -0800 Organization: Caltech Lines: 7 Sender: arrigo@modena.vision.caltech.edu Message-ID: References: NNTP-Posting-Host: modena.vision.caltech.edu Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii User-Agent: Gnus/5.0807 (Gnus v5.8.7) Emacs/20.4 Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.ifi.unizh.ch!news.imp.ch!news-spur1.maxwell.syr.edu!news.maxwell.syr.edu!logbridge.uoregon.edu!nntp-server.caltech.edu!news Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch comp.arch.fpga:3512 IBM used to make some nice RAMDACs. I just checked out www.chips.ibm.com and it seems that they are not making them anymore. Another vendor is Analog Devices. Good luck, -Arrigo