A low-power MCU + embedded FPGA in a Feather form factor with on-board sensors
QuickFeather is a development board for the QuickLogic EOS S3, a low-power System-on-Chip (SoC) that has both an Arm® Cortex®-M4F MCU and an embedded FPGA to enable the next generation of low-power embedded Machine Learning (ML).
The board ties into the Adafruit Feather ecosystem of over 60 pre-existing add-on boards, can be powered from and charge Li-Po batteries, and has an on-board microphone, accelerometer, and pressure sensor.
Open Source Everything
As part of our recently announced QuickLogic Open Reconfigurable Computing (QORC) initiative, we took special care to make everything about QuickFeather open source, from the hardware, to the software, to the tools. The FPGA industry is ripe for the sort of change open source has to offer - QuickFeather is our way of welcoming that change!
Open Hardware & Design Tools
Not only is the QuickFeather board itself open hardware, it was designed in the open source EDA platform, KiCad. Full KiCad project source files and final Gerber files can be found in our GitHub repository.
Open Embedded OS
It’s easy to use QuickFeather with Zephyr RTOS via our QuickLogic fork. Similarly, we’ve integrated FreeRTOS into our QORC SDK, which explicitly supports the QuickFeather board and includes sample code for getting started. Also, there is a QuickFeather integration for NuttX.
Open FPGA Tools
We worked directly with key members of the SymbiFlow community to make sure the embedded FPGA (eFPGA) in the EOS S3 SoC used on QuickFeather is fully supported by SymbiFlow’s excellent Verilog-to-bitstream tools. We also partnered with Antmicro to add support for the EOS S3 SoC in the open source Renode simulation and testing framework.
Open Machine Learning
QuickFeather’s combination of sensors, programmable logic, and low-power microcontroller make it a perfect hardware platform for the open source TensorFlow Lite machine learning tools.
SensiML
For rapid development of custom embedded AI algorithms to run on QuickFeather or any other device based on the EOS S3 SoC, we recommend the SensiML Analytics Toolkit.
Features & Specfications
- EOS S3 MCU + eFPGA SoC
- Arm® Cortex®-M4F Microcontroller
- up to 80 MHz operating frequency
- up to 512 Kb SRAM
- Embedded FPGA (eFPGA)
- 2400 effective logic cells
- 64 Kb RAM
- Arm® Cortex®-M4F Microcontroller
- Feather Form Factor
- Breadboard-compatible 0.1" (2.54 mm) pitch headers - all headers are pre-soldered
- 2.3" x 0.9" (58.4 mm x 22.9 mm) footprint
- All 20 Feather-defined GPIO + 13 additional GPIO
- Interfaces
- SWD programming connector for use with USB-TTL converter
- USB data signals are tied to eFPGA programmable logic
- UART available via I/O headers
- I²C
- I²S
- SPI
- Storage: 16 Mbit SPI NOR flash - GigaDevice GD25Q16CEIGR
- Sensors
- Accelerometer - mCube MC3635
- Pressure sensor - Infineon DPS310
- Digital pulse density modulation (PDM) microphone - Infineon IM69D130
- User Interfaces
- RGB LED
- User pushbutton
- Reset pushbutton
- Power
- USB micro Type-B connector (regulated to 3.3 V)
- Li-Po battery
- On-board charging circuitry - Microchip MCP73831/2
- Standard Li-Po JST connector
- Software
- Machine Learning
- Real-time Operating Systems
- FPGA Tools
EOS S3 SoC
The QuickFeather board features the QuickLogic EOS S3 System-on-Chip (SoC), which contains a low-power Arm® Cortex®-M4F processor and an embedded FPGA. The EOS S3 SoC is available in a variety of packages, including QFN and BGA. The QFN version is used on the QuickFeather board, however it is being phased out in favor of the BGA version.
Support & Documentation
- QuickFeather User Guide
- Hardware Files
- QORC SDK with FreeRTOS
- QuickLogic fork of Zephyr RTOS
- SymbiFlow Tutorial
