Altera Unveils Agilex 3 SoC FPGA Lineup Featuring Intel’s 7nm Technology

Silicon Valley, October 2024 – Altera, a wholly owned subsidiary of Intel, has launched an innovative line of SoC FPGAs: the Altera Agilex 3 series. Built on Intel’s cutting-edge 7nm technology, these new devices promise superior cost and power efficiency without compromising on performance, symbolising a significant leap in FPGA (Field Programmable Gate Array) technology.

Key Innovations and Specifications

The Agilex 3 series offers a multitude of sophisticated features aimed at a broad spectrum of applications ranging from manufacturing and surveillance to medical and edge computing. At its core, the series is built on the Hyperflex architecture, known for doubling the performance of the previous Cyclone V generation by utilising "registers everywhere," enabling swift signal routing and increased bandwidth. This means the Agilex 3 can achieve speeds of up to 12.5 Gbps and boasts a 1.9x performance improvement over its predecessor.

Features

  • Integrated Processor: A dual-core Arm Cortex A55 processor, clocking up to 800 MHz, which supports secure boot, AES encryption, and secure hash algorithms, marks a significant upgrade in processing power and security.
  • FPGA Fabric: The devices feature 25,000 to 135,000 logic elements, with transceivers supporting data rates up to 12.5 Gbps. The FPGAs also integrate up to 180 GFLOPS of single-precision processing power, variable precision DSP blocks, and AI Tensor blocks.
  • Memory: Each device in the series includes 512 KB of on-chip LPDDR4 RAM and an external memory interface supporting up to 2,133 Mbps. Additionally, the FPGA integrates 8.3 Mb of total on-chip RAM with hard error correction code (ECC) support, further ensuring data integrity.
  • Advanced I/O Options: Offering as many as 48 general-purpose I/Os and support for PCIe 3.0, MIPI D-PHY, and low-voltage differential signalling (LVDS), the Agilex 3 series stands out in connectivity and flexibility.

Device Variants

While the currently detailed product table primarily provides information on the C-Series variants (A3C025, A3C050, A3C065, A3C100, A3C135), there is mention of a B-Series, although specific details remain undisclosed.

Enhanced Software and Tools

To complement these advanced hardware features, Altera supplies an equally robust software suite. The Quartus Prime Pro Edition design suite and Intel’s oneAPI streamline FPGA design and development processes. Additional tools like the Transceiver Toolkit, Platform Designer, DSP Builder, and Arm Development Studio cater specifically to the Agilex 3, fortifying the development ecosystem.

Market Availability and Future Developments

Although the Agilex 3 SoC FPGA is slated for market availability in the first quarter of 2025, the development kits and system-on-modules (SoMs) based on Agilex 5, introduced earlier in 2024, are accessible through Altera’s Partner Showcase site.

Context and Background

Altera has been a prominent player in the FPGA arena, consistently innovating with their Agilex product lines. The debut of Agilex 7 FPGAs in 2019 and subsequent Agilex 5 E-series modules earlier this year have laid the groundwork for the advanced functionalities showcased by the Agilex 3.

Conclusion

Altera’s new Agilex 3 series marks a considerable advancement in FPGA technology. By leveraging Intel’s 7nm process and the Hyperflex architecture, it brings new levels of performance, efficiency, and versatility, poised to serve a wide range of industrial applications.

For more detailed specifications and updates, interested parties can visit Altera’s product page and official press releases.

Technical content writer and embedded engineer Debashis Das compiled this report, drawing on over five years of industry experience to demystify complex technical innovations.

Source: Noah Wire Services