The military and aerospace market has long relied on generic processing boards, using standard bus protocols and connectors. Historically, these processing boards used a general-purpose processor (GPP), a digital signal processor, and a small FPGA to assume the bus interfaces and integrate specific logic (glue logic).
Today, these processing boards are relying more and more on high-performance Stratix® series FPGAs to progressively replace the digital signal processor. FPGAs easily achieve the performance-to-power board requirements and provide a more efficient performance-to-dollar ratio. FPGAs, together with the system-on-a-programmable-chip (SOPC) methodology, offer additional value. You can upgrade commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) boards by downloading new SOPC versions of avionics, radar, sonar, and electronics warfare applications. To extend COTS board product lifetimes, other important features and enhancements can be incorporated into the design:
The following leading COTS computer manufacturers use Altera® solutions extensively to power their COTS boards:
Alteras solution for COTS computer applications includes: