Hello all, I want to buy a TI or Analog DSP dev board and start learning some assembly/C level programming for it. I am very comfortable doing DSP algorithms in MATLAB and also have decent C skills. My initial projects would be related to speech and audio processing, so the board should have capabilities in that area. After reading previous threads on comp.dsp, Analog's 21161N-EZLite looks like a good bet. I also read that Analog's instruction set is easier/more intuitive than TI's. However, I am under the impression that TI is more widely used in the industry, so experience with TI boards may be more "marketable". Should I buy and learn to work on a TI board with speech/audio capabilities for this reason? If yes, any recommendations for a TI kit? Also, my budget is ~$250, should I buy the board direct from Analog/TI or from a third-party? I would prefer one with a graphical IDE. TIA, Siddharth
DSP kit advice, again!
Started by ●October 15, 2003
Reply by ●October 15, 20032003-10-15
"Siddharth Mathur" <smathur@removethis.softhome.net> wrote in news:bmk1ea$511$1@oasis.ccit.arizona.edu:> Hello all, > > I want to buy a TI or Analog DSP dev board and start learning some > assembly/C level programming for it. I am very comfortable doing DSP > algorithms in MATLAB and also have decent C skills. > My initial projects would be related to speech and audio processing, > so the board should have capabilities in that area. > > After reading previous threads on comp.dsp, Analog's 21161N-EZLite > looks like a good bet. I also read that Analog's instruction set is > easier/more intuitive than TI's. However, I am under the impression > that TI is more widely used in the industry, so experience with TI > boards may be more "marketable". Should I buy and learn to work on a > TI board with speech/audio capabilities for this reason? If yes, any > recommendations for a TI kit? > > Also, my budget is ~$250, should I buy the board direct from Analog/TI > or from a third-party? I would prefer one with a graphical IDE. > > > TIA, > Siddharth > > >Siddharth, If you look at market share, TI is the largest DSP company. However if you factor out cell phones sales which account for 2/3 of all DSP sales, then a different picture emerges: TI and Analog both have about 30% of the "rest of the world" market. Everyone else makes up the remainder. You may have noticed that TI and Analog get about even exposure in this group. In the pro audio world, Analog Devices is clearly the new leader. This was a space previously dominated by Motorola. At the recent AES conference, Motorola didn't even have an exhibit booth and TI was concentrating on non-DSP products. TI does have a strong speech application market. If you go with the Sharc, the 21161 is a good product. We sell several products based on this DSP. The new ADSP-21262 is in most respects, a better choice, We have a new dspstak 21262sx board and ADI will be shipping their new 21262 EZ Kit in 4 to 6 weeks. The code is compatible with the 21161 so either choice is probably fine for learning. There are many reasons to choice one DSP supplier versus another. I made my bet with Analog many years ago and it has been a great choice. From strictly a business point of view, either Analog or TI would be a solid choice. -- Al Clark Danville Signal Processing, Inc. -------------------------------------------------------------------- Purveyors of Fine DSP Hardware and other Cool Stuff Available at http://www.danvillesignal.com
Reply by ●October 16, 20032003-10-16
Siddharth Mathur wrote:> Hello all, > > I want to buy a TI or Analog DSP dev board and start learning some > assembly/C level programming for it. I am very comfortable doing > DSP algorithms in MATLAB and also have decent C skills. > My initial projects would be related to speech and audio > processing, so the board should have capabilities in that area. > > After reading previous threads on comp.dsp, Analog's 21161N-EZLite > looks like a good bet. I also read that Analog's instruction set > is easier/more intuitive than TI's. However, I am under the > impression that TI is more widely used in the industry, so > experience with TI boards may be more "marketable". Should I buy > and learn to work on a TI board with speech/audio capabilities for > this reason? If yes, any recommendations for a TI kit? > > Also, my budget is ~$250, should I buy the board direct from > Analog/TI or from a third-party? I would prefer one with a > graphical IDE. > > > TIA, > SiddharthHello Siddharth, I've been working with a 21161N-EZLite board for quite a while, and to my opinion it's a good choice. An alternative choice might be the Blackfin boards. Selection will probably depend on I/O requirements. I don't think that TI would be preferable in your case , although TI do an immense marketing effort to convince the world that they're best. In your case I'd buy the ADI board and not another of a third party vendor, because ADI provides good support if you're using their IDE in combination with their board. It might be more difficult to investigate problems in combination with other boards. And: ADI's EZLite-board comes with a (restricted) license for their VisualDSP IDE. This is a good starting point. Learning DSP programming is not so much learning the language of a special DSP device. It's more understanding concepts and mapping of mathematical algorithms to the realm of DSP code bordered by hardware limitations. If you've done this with one DSP, it will be easy to transfer your knowledge to any other DSP family. You'll probably end up doing most of your coding in C/C++, not in assembly, and you'll certainly find out that most of your code will be completely portable between different DSPs, even if you transfer it from ADI's Sharc to the TI-world. Only very time-critical stuff and I/O handling will fail because of big differences. Bernhard
Reply by ●October 16, 20032003-10-16
"Siddharth Mathur" <smathur@removethis.softhome.net> wrote in message news:<bmk1ea$511$1@oasis.ccit.arizona.edu>...> Hello all, > > I want to buy a TI or Analog DSP dev board and start learning some > assembly/C level programming for it. I am very comfortable doing DSP > algorithms in MATLAB and also have decent C skills. > My initial projects would be related to speech and audio processing, so the > board should have capabilities in that area. > > After reading previous threads on comp.dsp, Analog's 21161N-EZLite looks > like a good bet. I also read that Analog's instruction set is easier/more > intuitive than TI's. However, I am under the impression that TI is more > widely used in the industry, so experience with TI boards may be more > "marketable". Should I buy and learn to work on a TI board with speech/audio > capabilities for this reason? If yes, any recommendations for a TI kit? > > Also, my budget is ~$250, should I buy the board direct from Analog/TI or > from a third-party? I would prefer one with a graphical IDE. > > > TIA, > SiddharthI'd say the TI C6711 DSK is a good start. It comes with built in JTAG emulator and bundled with Code Composer Studio that is a coplete GUI with debugger and compiler. The C6711DSK has built in speech codec with 8KHz sampling rate. Regarding TIs instruction set being more difficult that analogs I'd say that is based on earlier TI DSP generations like C20 and c50 that are a bit cryptical. The C6000 architecture is a completely new design and is much cleaner. It has a modern load/store RISC intruction set. It is not trivial to program in assembly since it has VLIW instruction scheduling but in my opinion it makes it more interesting. There are tools to make things easier (linear assembly). Compared with the EZlite from analog I'd say the tools is quite similar (both CCS and VisualDSP are heavily influenced by VC++). TI has more resources like examples and application notes on their website. Also, if you search amazon.com you can eaisily find three books specific to DSP on TI C6000, my brief search turned up nothing for the Sharc. Which is more "Marketable" depends on what market you plan to work in. TI is very dominant in telecom, not only in cellphone but also in infrastructure. A huge part of the worlds cellular base stations use C6000 chips. In audio and medical Analog is stronger. /Regards, P�r LIgander
