A comparison between DSP and FPGA platforms for real-time imaging applications

Mukul Shirvaikar; Tariq Bushnaq

doi:10.1117/12.806099

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4 February 2009 A comparison between DSP and FPGA platforms for real-time imaging applications

Mukul Shirvaikar, Tariq Bushnaq

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Proceedings Volume 7244, Real-Time Image and Video Processing 2009; 724406 (2009) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.806099
Event: IS&T/SPIE Electronic Imaging, 2009, San Jose, California, United States

Abstract

Real-time applications impose serious demands on hardware size, time deadlines, power dissipation, and cost of the solution. A typical system may also require modification of parameters during operation. Digital Signal Processors (DSPs) are a special class of microprocessors designed to specifically address real time implementation issues. As the complexity of real-time systems increases the need to introduce more efficient hardware platforms grows. In recent years Field Programmable Gate Arrays (FPGAs) have gained a lot of traction in the real-time community, as a replacement for the traditional DSP solutions. FPGAs are indeed revolutionizing image and signal processing due to their advanced capabilities such as reconfigurability. The Discrete Wavelet Transform is a classic real-time imaging algorithm that is drawing the attention of engineers in recent years. In this paper, we compare the FPGA implementation of 2-D liftingbased wavelet transform using optimized hand written VHDL code with a DSP implementation of the same algorithm using the C language. The goal of this paper is to compare the development effort and the performance of a traditional DSP processor to a FPGA based implementation of an image real-time application. The results of the experiment proves the superiority of FPGAs over traditional DSP processors in terms of time execution, power dissipation, and hardware utilization, nevertheless this advantage comes at the cost of a higher development effort. The hardware platform used is an Altera DE2 board with a 50MHz Cyclone II FPGA chip and a TI TMS320C6416 DSP Starter Kit (DSK).

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Mukul Shirvaikar and Tariq Bushnaq "A comparison between DSP and FPGA platforms for real-time imaging applications", Proc. SPIE 7244, Real-Time Image and Video Processing 2009, 724406 (4 February 2009); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.806099

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