-- An I/O companion board for Renesas “R-Car H2” for evaluating Renesas SoCs and FPGAs --

YOKOHAMA, Japan — (BUSINESS WIRE) — March 12, 2014 — Altima Corp. today announced the sales launch of “Hydra” FPGA development kit (model: ALTHYDRA5CGX) for use in car infotainment equipped with Altera's low cost FPGA Cyclone V GX starting on March 12th, 2014.

FPGA development kit for car infotainment (Hydra) (Photo: Business Wire)

Hydra is an I/O companion board for "R-Car H2," the second-generation car infotainment SoC (system-on-chip) from Renesas Electronics Corporation. The Hydra development kit comes equipped with an Altera Cyclone V GX automotive temperature grade FPGA that puts optimal performance within reach at minimal system cost and low power consumption. This scalable platform complements interfaces and functions of the SoCs for car infotainment systems.

In recent years car infotainment systems, amid ever higher performance and diversity demands, needs to provide support for: a wide variety of LCD panel interfaces; parking assistant features that use multi-channel video inputs due to having multiple car-mounted cameras; and video processing compatible with high-resolution panels. To this end, you can expand capabilities of the car infotainment SoCs by connecting the required daughter card to the high-speed interface (HSMC: High-Speed Mezzanine Connector) equipped on this development kit. Also, you will be able to reduce the component cost of the end-product by building a flexible platform to adopt different specifications for each function and end market.

In addition to this development kit, Altima is developing various peripherals including a video interface cable (model: ALTHYDRAVIN) that can be connected to a board with Renesas R-Car H2 SoC, an LVDS daughter card (model: ALTHYDRALVDS), and a configuration daughter card (model: ALTHYDRACONFG). These will be released for sale as they become available. Combining these peripherals with Hydra and Renesas board with R-Car H2, you can evaluate video input expansions and an array of different types of interfaces. Also note that this development kit can be used alone to evaluate FPGAs.

Altima offers these products under Macnica Group's technology brand "Mpression" not only domestically in Japan, but also in North America, China, Taiwan, and ASEAN countries through each respective Macnica subsidiary.

Special features of Altima's "Hydra" (model: ALTHYDA5CGX)

• Equipped with an automotive temperature grade FPGA
• Connectable to a Renesas board with R-Car H2
  (Video interface cable, LVDS daughter card, and configuration board sold separately)
• High-speed I/F capable: can connect with HSMC equipped daughter boards

"Hydra" (model: ALTHYDRA5CGX) main specifications

• FPGA: Cyclone V GX (5CGXFC7C6U19A7N; automotive temperature grade product)
• Memory: DDR3-800 32bit x 2, Flash memory
• Expansion connector: HSMC x 1, EXIO x 1 (to connect with a Renesas board with R-Car H2)
• Additional interfaces: PCI Express Gen1 x1 Lane, Ethernet (10/100), Push switch

"Video Interface Cable" (model: ALTHYDRAVIN) main specifications

• Cable with Samtec connectors
• Can connect to EXIO port of Hydra and a Renesas board with R-Car H2

"LVDS daughter card" (model: ALTHYDRALVDS) main specifications

• Equipped with LVDS Rx (Receive), Tx (Transmit), and EXIO connectors
• The LVDS port on a Renesas board with R-Car H2 and the EXIO port on Hydra can be connected using the included LVDS cable.

"Configuration/Daughter card" (model: ALTHYDRACONFG) main specifications

• LVDS Rx (Receive), and Tx (Transmit) connectors
• The EXIO on a Renesas board with R-Car H2 and the PFL connector on Hydra can be connected using the included configuration cable.

Product Specifications and details
http://www.m-pression.com/solutions/boards/hydra-board

Sales commencement-time

• March 2014 : order-acceptance and shipping