
PYNQ-Z1 – The first dev board to support Pynq, a Python platform for Zync SoC - mafuyu
https://forums.xilinx.com/t5/Xcell-Daily-Blog/Python-Zynq-PYNQ-which-runs-on-Digilent-s-new-229-pink-PYNQ-Z1/ba-p/726277
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microcolonel
I bought a Zybo last year and I activated the software; but it never let me
build any of the demo projects. I haven't been able to resolve this or get
support, it's been collecting dust. I don't know if I ever want to buy an FPGA
dev board without an open source toolchain ever again.

On the other hand, I have a pile of nice iCE40 FPGAs and they are awesome.
Thanks to Clifford Wolf, I can go from verilog to bitcode with a quality, free
toolchain. I don't need to worry about which machine it's locked to, what
random bugs will manifest in the random version of Eclipse required to run it,
etc.

~~~
TD-Linux
I was able to make successful projects with the Zynq a few years ago, but it
is a pretty steep challenge - it requires pretty broad knowledge of software,
Linux, and hardware design. The general process was very convoluted -
requiring HDL to be wrapped in top level components defined in the Vivado GUI.
It worked well once you figured out what was going on, but the learning curve
is pretty steep. I tried to touch the GUI as least as possible - I did unit
tests with Icarus Verilog instead, and had my own script for packaging and
live reloading the FPGA bitstream (a pretty neat trick that Xilinx pulls off,
there). I did wonder how someone lacking any of the pieces of knowledge would
ever get it to work - and indeed, a blog post I made about it working gathered
many responses of people having trouble making a similar basic project.

A side note - the Zynq is one of the better documented SoCs out there (aside
from the FPGA bitstream itself), so it might be worth considering just for
that.

I also have tried Clifford Wolf's tools, and they are absolutely wonderful.
It's the way I wish all FPGAs worked. It's amazingly complete - I wouldn't
hesitate to ship a product using a bitstream generated from
yosys/arachne/icestorm.

Extra extra side note - in some cases that used to require FPGAs, you can now
get away with bit-banging from a normal microcontroller. Most newish micros
can do single cycle GPIO writes, and can be clocked over 100MHz.

~~~
anyfoo
I agree. The learning curve for doing projects with the Zybo is pretty steep,
and especially since it was my first foray into FPGAs, the first few days
could be very frustrating at times.

I got over it eventually, but I think me having some experience with very low
level kernel programming and digital electronics in general probably helped a
lot. Since then, it's been great fun.

Overall, I don't think I'm a big fan of Vivado (though it's hard to say
without any experience with any competitor's environment), but the Zybo itself
it so packed full of fun components, and the Zynq itself such an apparently
versatile and well documented chip (though again, not much personal reference
in that) that I still recommend it.

------
cmdrfred
Looks nice but compared to a Raspberry Pi the price is a bit hard to swallow.

~~~
TD-Linux
But unlike the BCM2835, you can straight up buy a chip on Digikey:
[https://www.digikey.com/product-detail/en/xilinx-
inc/XC7Z020...](https://www.digikey.com/product-detail/en/xilinx-
inc/XC7Z020-1CLG400C/122-1851-ND/3925758)

------
doty
I think this PYNQ is Python Productivity for ZYNC
([http://www.pynq.io/](http://www.pynq.io/)), not "Python Implementation of
Linq"
([https://github.com/heynemann/pynq](https://github.com/heynemann/pynq)), as
suggested by the title.

