Anadigm (a company formed in January 2000 as venture-backed technology spin-off from Motorola) were showing their new Field Programmable Analog Array (FPAA) chip at NAMM this year. It offers the flexibility of a programmable logic array (FPGA) in the analog design space opening up design possibilities at a low price point (sub $10 per chip) only previously available at significantly higher cost in custom chip solutions or discrete implementations. As this little beast is software programmable and has a tight tolerance (overall <1% variation in design implementations between chips) these can be used for fast prototyping and implementation of designs. In addition to this its good noise performance and low cost means they can get out of the lab and be used in production. The possibilities for these chips are endless (although you may need more than one to cover the full audio band. Because each one is a basic building block of 4 op-amps allowing you to cover 7 octaves. So you could use these devices in Oscillators, Resonant Filters and more besides. At these prices a polyphonic analog synth would not require the same custom chips present in the Andromeda (although they do have their advantages). I think over the next few months we’ll see lots of new devices springing up based upon these chips. Anadigm expect systems using these devices to be on show at Summer NAMM. Rumour has it Bob Moog was seen at the stand talking over the possibilities. We’ll keep an eye on this product and bring you any news.

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< More From: ANADIGM

• MESSE: FPGA Analog Chip Developments 03-Apr-04

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