a3p250l Actel Corporation, a3p250l Datasheet - Page 5

• Manufacturer Part Number: a3p250l
• Description: Proasic3l Low-power Flash Fpgas With Flash*freeze Technology
• Manufacturer: Actel Corporation

1 – ProASIC3L Device Family Overview
General Description
The ProASIC3L family of Actel flash FPGAs dramatically reduces dynamic power consumption by
40% and static power by 50%. These power savings are coupled with performance, density, true
single-chip, 1.2 V to 1.5 V core and I/O operation as low as 1.2 V, reprogrammability, and advanced
features.
Using Actel's proven Flash*Freeze technology enables users to shut off dynamic power
instantaneously and switch the device to static mode without the need to switch off clocks or
power supplies while retaining internal states of the device. This greatly simplifies power
management on a board done through I/Os and clocks. In addition, optimized software tools using
power-driven layout provide instant push-button power reduction.
Nonvolatile flash technology gives ProASIC3L devices the advantage of being a secure, low-power,
single-chip solution that is live at power-up (LAPU). ProASIC3L offers dramatic dynamic power
savings giving the FPGA users flexibility to combine low power with high performance.
These features enable designers to create high-density systems using existing ASIC or FPGA design
flows and tools.
ProASIC3L devices offer 1 kbit of on-chip, reprogrammable, nonvolatile FlashROM storage as well
as clock conditioning circuitry (CCC) based on an integrated phase-locked loop (PLL). ProASIC3L
devices support devices from 250 k system gates to 3 million system gates with up to 504 kbits of
true dual-port SRAM and 620 user I/Os.
M1 ProASIC3L devices support the high-performance, 32-bit Cortex-M1 processor developed by
ARM for implementation in FPGAs. ARM Cortex-M1 is a soft processor that is fully implemented in
the FPGA fabric. It has a three-stage pipeline that offers a good balance between low-power
consumption and speed when implemented in an M1 ProASIC3L device. The processor runs the
ARMv6-M instruction set, has a configurable nested interrupt controller, and can be implemented
with or without the debug block. ARM Cortex-M1 is available for free from Actel for use in M1
ProASIC3L FPGAs.
The ARM-enabled devices have Actel ordering numbers that begin with M1 and do not support
AES decryption.
Flash*Freeze Technology
The ProASIC3L devices offer Actel's proven Flash*Freeze technology, which allows instantaneous
switching from an active state to a static state. ProASIC3L devices do not need additional
components to turn off I/Os or clocks while retaining the design information, SRAM content, and
registers. Flash*Freeze technology is combined with in-system programmability, which enables
users to quickly and easily upgrade and update their designs in the final stages of manufacturing
or in the field. The ability of ProASIC3L devices to support a wide range core voltage (1.2 V to 1.5 V)
allows for an even greater reduction in power consumption, which enables low total system power.
When the ProASIC3L device enters Flash*Freeze mode, the device automatically shuts off the clocks
and inputs to the FPGA core; when the device exits Flash*Freeze mode, all activity resumes and
data is retained.
The availability of low-power modes, combined with a reprogrammable, single-chip, single-voltage
solution, make ProASIC3L devices suitable for low-power data transfer and manipulation in
portable media, secure communications, radio applications as well as high performance portable,
industrial, test, scientific, and medical applications.
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