The digital processing is going on in a Xilinx XC3S400 FPGA. I purchased a Spartan-3 Starter Board from Digilent for $99 (see link below). It's got a 400,000 gate FPGA, three 2x20 right angle female header connectors for getting signals on and off the board, 8 slide switches, 4 pushbuttons, and 4-7SEG LED's. I also purchased a USB 2.0 module from Digilent for $47.95 and use it to communicate with my PC for programming the board.

Having 400,000 gates to do with what you'd like is a big change from the past. It used to be that you had to find the IC that you needed to perform a function, dig around your junk pile or order it from a parts supplier, wait for the part to arrive, stick it in a socket on a board, wirewrap the pins together correctly, and give your circuit a spin. Now, you write some code, compile it, download it to the FPGA and try it. Mess up? Do it again. This project is about 1000 lines of code and uses about 3% of the available gates in the FPGA.

Check out the Spartan-3 board at Digilent HERE

Check out the USB2 board at Digilent HERE

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