Avnet AES-XLX-V4FX-PCIe-PCB-B development board

Product Description

Avnet Xilinx Virtex-4 FX PCIe Development Board (AES-XLX-V4FX-PCIe-PCB-B) – High-Speed Serial Prototyping Platform

This used Avnet development board is a professional-grade platform designed for evaluating and prototyping with Xilinx’s Virtex-4 FX FPGA family, specifically targeting high-speed serial connectivity applications. The board was developed by Avnet Electronics Marketing as a comprehensive solution for designers working with RocketIO transceivers and embedded PowerPC processors.

This board was a core component of Avnet’s Xilinx Speedway Design Workshops, particularly the “Developing with V-4 RocketIO Transceivers” course. The workshop provided hands-on labs focusing on the ChipScope Pro Serial IO Toolkit for performing bit error ratio analysis. The board’s full design files and schematics are available online, allowing it to be used as a template for custom products.

Condition Note: This unit is untested and sold as-is. This listing includes the development board only.

---

Key Specifications

---

Board Features & Capabilities

High-Speed Serial Connectivity

• 8-lane PCI Express interface for host communication

• Two SFP module connectors for optical networking

• CX4 connector for InfiniBand copper cabling

• Serial ATA (SATA) host connector

• General purpose SMA port for external clock or high-speed signals

• Five general-purpose RocketIO links available for customization

Memory & Storage

• 64 Mbytes of SDRAM for application data

• 16 Mbytes of Flash memory for non-volatile storage

• Platform Flash configuration memory

On-Board Clocks

• 100 MHz LVTTL oscillator

• Programmable LVDS clock generators

• LVTTL oscillator socket for custom frequency

• Differential SMA clock inputs

User Interface & Debug

• LCD panel for status display

• Undedicated switches and LEDs

• USB port for auxiliary connectivity

• Serial port for debug console

Expansion Capability

• Avnet EXP expansion slot providing 168 high-speed, single-ended and differential user I/O

• Standard or custom EXP modules can be added for application-specific interfaces

---

Virtex-4 FX FPGA Features (Device Dependent)

The Virtex-4 FX family offers powerful features for high-performance applications:

---

Applications

• PCI Express Prototyping: Development of custom PCIe Gen1 x1, x4, or x8 endpoint devices

• High-Speed Serial Communications: SATA, Gigabit Ethernet, and optical link prototyping

• Embedded Processing: PowerPC 405-based system development

• RocketIO Transceiver Evaluation: BER testing using ChipScope Pro Serial IO Toolkit

• FPGA-based Coprocessing: Custom accelerator development for PC systems

• Avnet EXP Module Development: Custom I/O expansion using the EXP slot

• Legacy System Support: Maintaining existing Virtex-4 FX based products