Altera and BittWare develop software programmable reconfiguration platform

Altera and BittWare have announced a Software Programmable Reconfiguration (SPR) reference platform for use by designers of software-defined radio (SDR) applications. With this SPR platform, developers of SDRs and other digital signal processing (DSP)-based applications can explore software reconfiguration of military waveform functionality.

The SPR platform leverages AMC and MicroTCA form factors with BittWare's hybrid FPGA coprocessing products and Altera's Cyclone III FPGA family. The platform consists of BittWare's RapidTCA developer systems and Altera's Cyclone III FPGA developer kit. The reference design includes a SPR design methodology for waveform and DSP within the FPGA.

The result is a software-based methodology for reconfiguring system functionality. The SPR platform is claimed to reduce development times for SDRs and DSP-based applications by replacing multiple iterations of hardware reconfigurations with software compiles, thereby reducing risk and accelerating SDR hardware system creation.

Altera and BittWare will be demonstrating the SPR platform in Altera's booth (#1430) at MILCOM 2007 held in Orlando, Fla., October 29 through 31.

Pricing and availability
The SPR reference platform is currently available from BittWare, with prices starting at $12,500. For more information about the reference platform, contact your local Altera or BittWare sales representative or click Here to visit the relevant page on the Altera site or Here to visit the corresponding page on the BittWare site.