Using a DSP-FPGA Architecture with PowerPC Cores for High-density Packetized Voice (VoIP/VoN) Processing Applications

Hybrid DSP/FPGA/RISC architectures can be very effective for high-performance Voice-over-Network (VoN), or VoIP processing applications. DSP capabilities in newer FPGA devices allow for the signal processing to be partitioned and balanced between the DSP and the FPGA. Moreover, new capabilities in Xilinx's Virtex-II Pro FPGA platform, such as PowerPC cores, can be used to include the protocol layer and network interface in the FPGA, thereby increasing the density of the VoIP/VoN solution. This article explores the design aspects of a VoIP system using this architecture.