Getting going with a Verilog simulatior for free? |

Getting going with a Verilog simulatior for free?

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Someone just asked me as to the simplest / best option for getting someone going with a Verilog simulator for free? (One that works in Windows). Any suggestions?

Discussion started by Clive Maxfield , on 21 September 07:31 AM

Replies

Karl Stevens, 2010-05-12 11:28:31

Do you mean to simulate after compiling to RTL and then simulating, or simulating Verilog directly? I did a prototype to run Verilog, but due to lack of interest I switched to designing a processor that runs C without the compile to intermediate language then JIT compile to machine language. Simple design, runs very fast, but still no interest. Everybody whines about the tools, but refuse to even consider something different. Like the old story "We have hit absolute bottom, but we continue to dig!"

Antti Lukats, 2009-11-12 12:44:19

eh icarus verilog has been really usable for many many years already.
Fully free, useable in windows as well.

last thing i tested with it was PDP-11 running UNIX, the verilog core emulating PDP did boot up and UNIX prompt appeared...

I am sure it is useable for smaller tasks as well.

Ken Coffman, 2009-11-03 12:00:45

You can probably find an old demo version of Silos III (e-mail me if you can't find it online). It's easy to use and the free verion supports a big enough design to be useful.

Jay Dowling, 2009-09-28 14:21:49

Xilinx actually has 2 with their free tool. One is a ModelSim lite and the other is without restrictions and is their own. Latice and Actel also have them. Cypress has just formally announced the PSoC 3 & 5 at ESC and the FPGA part of the SoC can be done in Verily using what was formerly WARP. Plus there are free tools out there like Icarus. But the really question is who has used them? How difficult are they to configure and use? What are their limits (LOC, modules or time)? How fast are they? Are they worth the effort of using them? Are they easy to use (I use to like using Silos, it was very easy)?

Tom VanCourt, 2009-09-28 14:02:12

I know Altera has and I think Xilinx also has at least some simulation capability in their free "web" editions.