Synopsys, Inc.
FPGA-based hardware emulator system with an inter-FPGA connection switch

Abstract:

A hardware emulation system for emulating an integrated circuit design under test (DUT) includes a switch system, FPGAs and serial transmitter and receiver circuitry. The switch system has input and output ports and is configurable to change which ports are connected to each other. The FPGAs are configurable to emulate a functionality of the DUT. The functionality of the DUT is partitioned across multiple FPGAs. The serial transmitter circuitry transmits data from the FPGAs on serial lines to the ports of the switch system. The serial receiver circuitry receives data for the FPGAs on serial lines from the ports of the switch system.