Whitepaper: FPGA-Controlled Test (FCT): What it is and why is it needed? (Asset)

Whitepaper: FPGA-Controlled Test (FCT): What it is and why is it needed? (Asset)

Functionally, the role that FPGAs (field programmable gate arrays) have played in computer and communications systems has grown in parallel with the number of gates and the capabilities of these devices. A recent study by the Linley Group found that the deployment of FPGAs grew 51 percent in 2010, a testament to the rapidly increasing pervasiveness of these devices. Typically, FPGAs have been deployed by system designers for downstream, end-user functionality, such as logic engines, peripheral I/O management, communications coordination, graphics and multimedia processing, as well as other types of functionality. Now though, these versatile and flexible devices are emerging as a likely platform for next-generation embedded board test and measurement capabilities which can be employed upstream during design, development and manufacturing, and/or in ancillary downstream applications in the field following product launch, such as ongoing continuing engineering, remote diagnostics, troubleshooting and others.

This trend toward FPGA-controlled test (FCT) is a part of the larger shift toward embedded instrumentation as a more effective methodology for validating, testing and debugging circuit boards. Much of today’s leading-edge electronics technology has simply progressed beyond the reach of legacy, intrusive test technologies such as oscilloscopes and in-circuit test (ICT) systems. Because these legacy methodologies are based on making contact with chips on boards and circuit boards themselves, they are hobbled by the physical nature of probing. The next wave of validation and test technologies – which includes FCT – will be dominated by internal, nonintrusive software-driven embedded instrumentation methodologies.