FYI for anyone looking for such information:
Digilent has some relatively inexpensive ($60, $100, $150, ...) FPGA development boards; not the latest generations of devices, but good enough for a lot of things / learning. They also have some microcontroller boards et. al.
http://digilentinc.com/
A potentially interesting new $400 ARM7 + FPGA development board which can be used to prototype designs for the AT91CAP semi-customizable ARM chip with some integrated gate array type capabilities. Probably less useful / interesting if you don't plan to order a few thousand customized ARM chips in the future, though:
http://www.atmel.com/dyn/produ...9_2.html&family_id=689
A $400 Xilinx Virtex 5 FXT FPGA development board with a gigabit ethernet interface and the Virtex 5 FXT's embedded PowerPC 440 CPU integrated into the FPGA. Sadly no PCIE interface on this model of board, though the much more $$$ they have others with PCIE interfaces / SERDES:
http://www.xilinx.com/products..._v5fxt_evl30-avnet.htm
A $350 Xilinx Spartan 3 PCIE development board using an external PCIE PHY chip to interface the FPGA (which itself is incapable of direct PCIE interface) to the PCIE; one of the lower cost PCIE development cards I've seen, though it is based on a FPGA and PCIE PHY design that is somewhat obsoleted by the inclusion of PCIE compatible SERDES units in some of the newer generation Virtex 5 FPGAs to permit a direct PCIE interface with those alternative/newer generation chips. Unfortunately there seems to be no < $400 PCIE development card for the Virtex 5 chips, so, this may still be relevant. Also I'm not sure what the development tools and any needed IP cores for the Virtex 5 units with PCIE support cost, so maybe this is a better deal for hobby purposes anyway.
http://www.xilinx.com/products/devkits/HW-S3PCIE-DK.htm
PLX makes this PCIE to generic data bus (microprocessor or peripheral type) bridge chip; no low cost development cards are in sight as far as I know, though:
http://www.plxtech.com/products/expresslane/pex8311.asp
Cypress makes this 8051 core USB 2.0 High speed microcontroller that is probably a fairly low cost way to develop USB 2.0 High speed peripherals, though personally I prefer the ARM7/9/... type microcontrollers over the 8051s..
EZ-USB FX2LP : CY7C68013A
http://app.cypress.com/portal/...&fid=14&rpn=CY7C68013A
http://www.plxtech.com/products/expresslane/pex8311.asp
So the overall story seems to be use USB 2.0 High speed to achieve no better than 40 MBy/s transfer rates to get external data into a PC unless you're ready to spend $350+++ for a PCIE or GbEthernet FPGA based development board, or unless you're willing to build a complex SMT / BGA package 4-6 layer PCB design to use a PHY / FPGA / bridge chip design of your own.
Digilent has some relatively inexpensive ($60, $100, $150, ...) FPGA development boards; not the latest generations of devices, but good enough for a lot of things / learning. They also have some microcontroller boards et. al.
http://digilentinc.com/
A potentially interesting new $400 ARM7 + FPGA development board which can be used to prototype designs for the AT91CAP semi-customizable ARM chip with some integrated gate array type capabilities. Probably less useful / interesting if you don't plan to order a few thousand customized ARM chips in the future, though:
http://www.atmel.com/dyn/produ...9_2.html&family_id=689
A $400 Xilinx Virtex 5 FXT FPGA development board with a gigabit ethernet interface and the Virtex 5 FXT's embedded PowerPC 440 CPU integrated into the FPGA. Sadly no PCIE interface on this model of board, though the much more $$$ they have others with PCIE interfaces / SERDES:
http://www.xilinx.com/products..._v5fxt_evl30-avnet.htm
A $350 Xilinx Spartan 3 PCIE development board using an external PCIE PHY chip to interface the FPGA (which itself is incapable of direct PCIE interface) to the PCIE; one of the lower cost PCIE development cards I've seen, though it is based on a FPGA and PCIE PHY design that is somewhat obsoleted by the inclusion of PCIE compatible SERDES units in some of the newer generation Virtex 5 FPGAs to permit a direct PCIE interface with those alternative/newer generation chips. Unfortunately there seems to be no < $400 PCIE development card for the Virtex 5 chips, so, this may still be relevant. Also I'm not sure what the development tools and any needed IP cores for the Virtex 5 units with PCIE support cost, so maybe this is a better deal for hobby purposes anyway.
http://www.xilinx.com/products/devkits/HW-S3PCIE-DK.htm
PLX makes this PCIE to generic data bus (microprocessor or peripheral type) bridge chip; no low cost development cards are in sight as far as I know, though:
http://www.plxtech.com/products/expresslane/pex8311.asp
Cypress makes this 8051 core USB 2.0 High speed microcontroller that is probably a fairly low cost way to develop USB 2.0 High speed peripherals, though personally I prefer the ARM7/9/... type microcontrollers over the 8051s..
EZ-USB FX2LP : CY7C68013A
http://app.cypress.com/portal/...&fid=14&rpn=CY7C68013A
http://www.plxtech.com/products/expresslane/pex8311.asp
So the overall story seems to be use USB 2.0 High speed to achieve no better than 40 MBy/s transfer rates to get external data into a PC unless you're ready to spend $350+++ for a PCIE or GbEthernet FPGA based development board, or unless you're willing to build a complex SMT / BGA package 4-6 layer PCB design to use a PHY / FPGA / bridge chip design of your own.
Microchip provides a free C-compiler for the 16-bit mcus and 32-bit MCUs.
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