Altera PowerPlay Early Power Estimator - Manual (Page 13)

© June 2009 Altera Corporation PowerPlay Early Power Estimator User Guide for Cyclone III FPGAs
3. Using Cyclone III PowerPlay Early
Power Estimator
Introduction
The PowerPlay Early Power Estimator enables you to enter information into sections
based on architectural features. The PowerPlay Early Power Estimator also provides a
subtotal of power consumed by each architectural feature and is reported in each
section in watts (W).
PowerPlay Early Power Estimator Inputs
The following sections explain what values you must enter for each section of the
PowerPlay Early Power Estimator. The different Excel worksheets of the PowerPlay
Early Power Estimator are referred to as sections. Sections in the PowerPlay Early
Power Estimator calculate power representing architectural features of the device,
such as clocks, RAM blocks, or digital signal processing (DSP) blocks.
Main Input Parameters
Different Cyclone ® III devices consume different amounts of power for the same
design. The larger the device, the more power it consumes because of the larger die
and longer interconnects in the device.
In the Main section, you can enter the following parameters for the device and design:
■ Family
■ Device
■ Package
■ Temperature grade
■ Power characteristics
■ Ambient or junction temperature
■ Heat sink used
■ Airflow
■ Custom heat sink information
■ Board thermal model
1
Required parameters depend on whether junction temperature is manually entered or
auto-computed.