Nios II C-to-Hardware Acceleration Compiler
Features
- Push-button acceleration of ANSI/ISO C code
- Tight integration with software design flow
- Direct connection of hardware accelerators to CPU's memory map
- Seamless support for pointers and arrays
- Efficient latency-aware scheduling and pipelining of memory transactions
Dramatically Boost Embedded Software Performance
Introducing the award winning Nios® II embedded processor C-to-Hardware Acceleration (C2H) Compiler, a tool that boosts the performance of your time-critical ANSI C functions by converting them into hardware accelerators in the FPGA.
The Nios II C2H Compiler is a productivity tool for embedded designers using Altera's popular Nios II embedded processor. With the Nios II C2H Compiler you can:
- Quickly prototype algorithms in software
- Right-click to boost software performance using automated hardware acceleration
- Design using un-extended ANSI/ISO C code
- Develop using the familiar Eclipse-based Nios II IDE
- GHz performance with class power consumption
Hardware acceleration is a vital tool for software engineers who need to increase the performance of their embedded software applications. Hardware accelerators can take full advantage of the parallel processing structure of the FPGA to calculate more computations per clock cycle than general-purpose CPUs and deliver orders-of-magnitude increase in performance. See Table 1 for performance and area results for several common embedded computing algorithms.
| Table 1. User Application Results Example |
| Algorithm |
Speed Increase
(vs. Nios II CPU) |
System fMAX
(MHz) |
System Resource Increase (1) |
| Autocorrelation |
41.0x |
115 |
124% |
| Bit Allocation |
42.3x |
110 |
152% |
| Convolution Encoder |
13.3x |
95 |
133% |
| Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) |
15.0x |
85 |
208% |
| High Pass Filter |
42.9x |
110 |
181% |
| Matrix Rotate |
73.6x |
95 |
106% |
| RGB to CMYK |
41.5x |
120 |
84% |
| RGB to YIQ |
39.9x |
110 |
158% |
Note:
- System resource increase takes into account the logic element equivalent cost of on-chip resources such as multipliers and memories and shows the incremental cost of adding the accelerators and buffers.
This data shows that the Nios II C2H Compiler can deliver considerable performance gains with minimal added cost and resources. For details on these example results, see the Automated Generation of Hardware Accelerators White Paper (PDF).
Familiar Software Design Flow
Until now, offloading software to hardware accelerators was a manual task, benefiting only those developers with the tools, experience, and time required to create, test, and integrate register transfer level (RTL) blocks into their processor system. The Nios II C2H Compiler automates the creation and integration of hardware accelerators, reducing development time from weeks to minutes.
If you've used the Eclipse-based Nios II integrated development environment (IDE) before, designing with the Nios II C2H Compiler is even easier. All you need to do is:
- Profile your software code to identify performance-critical functions.
- Highlight the desired functions within the Nios II IDE and right-click to accelerate.
- Review the detailed C2H Compiler report file to determine simple C code optimizations.
- Optimize and iterate until desired performance is met.
- Quickly meet your performance requirements and ship your product ahead of schedule.
The Nios II C2H Compiler allows you to more quickly and efficiently explore the design space to optimize your application algorithms and to boost the performance over a software-only implementation. All you have to do is right-click to accelerate.
Ordering Information
You can order the Nios II C2H Compiler today. See Table 2 for pricing and ordering information. Additionally, a free evaluation is also available with the Nios II Embedded Design Suite download. Contact your local Altera® representative for purchasing details.
| Table 2. Nios II C2H Compiler Ordering Code and Pricing Information |
| Ordering Code |
Price |
Ordering Information |
| IPT-C2H-NIOS |
$2,995 |
In the United States and Canada, call 1-888-800-0631 or contact your local Altera representative. Outside North America, contact your local distributor. Download a free evaluation of the Nios II C2H Compiler included the latest version of the Nios II Embedded Design Suite. |
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