Xilinx Ships Industry's First 133MHz PCI-X 2.0 Core Mode 1

Newest IP core continues seven-year legacy of complete PCI-based solutions from Xilinx and provides customers with a smooth migration path to 133MHz designs

SAN JOSE, Calif., January 27, 2003 - Xilinx, Inc., (NASDAQ:XLNX) today announced that it is shipping a new IP core for use with its flagship Virtex®-II FPGAs supporting the PCI-X™ interface operating at speeds up to 133MHz. The PCI-X based 133MHz core from Xilinx is the first FPGA-based IP core that supports the current PCI-X specification - PCI-X 2.0 Mode 1 - which can move data on a local bus in excess of 1 gigabyte per second.

Today's news underscores Xilinx's commitment to PCI technology. The company shipped its first PCI core in 1996 and since then, has sold more PCI cores than all its competitors combined. All Xilinx PCI cores - including its PCI, PCI-X, and PCI Express solutions - are developed in-house for Xilinx FPGAs to provide designers with pre-tested, fully verified solutions that reduce risk and system costs while accelerating product development.

The PCI-X technology-based 133MHz core is a 64-bit, parallel interface that leverages the widely deployed PCI-X technology to connect peripheral equipment to high-end servers and workstations. The new core also supports slower speed implementations of PCI-X architecture such as 100MHz and 66MHz, allowing designers to use the same core to support a variety of legacy bus speeds in an application. The core also supports the conventional PCI standard running at 33MHz. This flexibility allows a single Virtex FPGA to host both conventional PCI and PCI-X designs from a single bitstream.

"PCI-X architecture is an important and powerful technology because it builds upon previous generations of the PCI standard. It protects the investments made in PCI-based buses within computing systems and provides a solution for the higher bandwidth I/O needed in the marketplace," said Al Yanes, PCI-SIG President (http://www.pcisig.com). "PCI-SIG is excited to see the successful introduction of new products based on the PCI-X 2.0 specification."

PCI-X technology is used in routers, hubs, and switches and a broad range of electronic equipment including industrial computers, digital and medical imaging systems, and embedded control and instrumentation systems. According to the industry report, Advanced Bus and Interface Market Trends, 2nd Edition, published by Electronic Trend Publications, Inc. (August, 2002), the number of systems equipped with the PCI-X interface is expected to increase fivefold, from two million units in 2002, to 10 million in 2005. While PCI-X architecture supports several different data rates, most applications under development today target the specification's maximum speed of 133MHz.

"PCI-X interfaces running at 133MHz is an important performance milestone for the PCI-X standard," said Mark Aaldering, senior director of the Intellectual Property Division at Xilinx. "Its rapid adoption will drive dramatic increases in the use of PCI-X busses. In addition to the growth in PCI-X 133MHz design starts, we expect to see a vast migration to serial connectivity solutions, where the PCI Express solution from Xilinx will be extremely valuable. The PCI-X and PCI Express cores from Xilinx are helping designers bridge the gap between serial and parallel I/O technologies."

As part of its PCI technology-based solution, Xilinx offers an entire ecosystem of support including, reference designs, Xilinx Design Services, Xilinx XPERTs 3rd party design services, training, technical support via telephone and in the field, and a comprehensive suite of application notes to help ensure a designer's success. For complete information about Xilinx IP solutions, visit www.xilinx.com/ipcenter.

Price and Availability The PCI-X based 133MHz core for use with Virtex-II devices is available now and includes a 3.3V compliant 64-bit PCI-X interface for up to 133MHz designs. The core is priced at $17,995 and can be configured and downloaded over the internet from the Xilinx IP Center at www.xilinx.com/ipcenter.

The core will also be available for use with Xilinx Virtex-II Pro FPGAs in the first quarter of 2003. Support of this core is part of the Xilinx Serial Tsunami initiative developed to provide customers with a complete set of solutions for designing high speed parallel interfaces while delivering the resources to implement, optimize, and test state-of-the-art serial I/O designs operating at 3.125 Gbits per second and beyond. The PCI-X based 133MHz core running on Virtex-II Pro FPGAs will allow high performance PCI-X busses to be hosted on the same device as advanced serial interfaces, thus bridging the gap between parallel and serial connectivity technologies.

About Xilinx

Xilinx, Inc. (NASDAQ: XLNX) is the worldwide leader of programmable logic and programmable system solutions. Additional information about Xilinx is available at www.xilinx.com.

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