It is now almost one year since I stopped writing on my FPGA from scratch blog. What has happened at Xilinx the last year. Let's find out. We will download the latest versions of ISE WebPack and EDK and take a look at all the new features. Here is the download page. Here are the ISE Design Suite 10.1 Release Notes.
The current version of ISE and EDK is 10.1 and now they come as a design suite which can be downloaded in one step. Here is a link to the ISE 10.1 Design Suite tutorial.
This time we will use the Webinstall, downloading a small installation program to our hard disk and then start the download of the complete package (almost 6GB). After unzipping the file 10.1_Webinstall.zip we have the following install directory.
We start the installation using the command sudo ./setup. After entering the registraion code the product selection window appears.
We select to install ISE WebPack, EDK and PlanAhead. After reading and accepting the software license and deciding where to install the final software, the installation starts.
Depending on our internet connection speed this download will take 1-24 hours. Sit back and relax. When the installation has finished we have the following directory structure added.
Before we can start using the new programs we have the add the setup scripts for both ISE and EDK (settings32.csh or settings32.sh) to our .bashrc startup script. Now we are ready to go.
Let's start with ISE.
-> ise&
The first thing that happens is the display of the "What's New in Xilinx Design Suite 10.1" window in our web browser.
After converting our old database to ISE 10.1 this window displays. It looks very much like before.
No big suprises here, so what about EDK 10.1. Let's start XPS (Xilinx Platform Studio) and find out.
-> xps&
The first thing we have to do is upgrading some of the IP blocks we are using. This wizard will help us.
Some of the IP blocks we have to fix ourselves.
And here is the old familiar XPS startup window.
For us the upgrade of the Microblaze processor is probably the most interesting subject in this new release. Let's take a closer look at Microblaze 7.10a
And one last thing. Don't forget to install the lastest service pack.
