Basys 3 Artix-7 FPGA Trainer Board: Recommended for Introductory Users

$165.00
(17 reviews) Write a Review
SKU:
410-183
UPC:
0799430212373
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The Basys 3 is one of the best boards on the market for getting started with FPGA. It is an entry-level development board built around a Xilinx Artix-7 FPGA.

As a complete and ready-to use digital circuit development platform, it includes enough switches, LEDs, and other I/O devices to allow a large number of designs to be completed without the need for any additional hardware. There are also enough uncommitted FPGA I/O pins to allow designs to be expanded using Digilent Pmods or other custom boards and circuits, and all of this at a student-friendly price point.

The Basys 3 is designed exclusively for Xilinx’s Vivado Design Suite, and the WebPACK edition is available as a free download from Xilinx.

Guides and demos are available to help users get started quickly with the Basys 3. These can be found through the Support Materials tab.

  • Features the Xilinx Artix-7 FPGA: XC7A35T-1CPG236C
  • 33,280 logic cells in 5200 slices (each slice contains four 6-input LUTs and 8 flip-flops) 
  • 1,800 Kbits of fast block RAM 
  • Five clock management tiles, each with a phase-locked loop (PLL)
  • 90 DSP slices
  • Internal clock speeds exceeding 450 MHz
  • On-chip analog-to-digital converter (XADC)
  • Digilent USB-JTAG port for FPGA programming and communication
  • Serial Flash 
  • USB-UART Bridge 
  • 12-bit VGA output 
  • USB HID Host for mice, keyboards and memory sticks 
  • 16 user switches 
  • 16 user LEDs
  • 5 user pushbuttons 
  • 4-digit 7-segment display
  • 4 Pmod ports: 3 Standard 12-pin Pmod ports, 1 dual purpose XADC signal / standard Pmod port
  • Micro-B USB cable not included, but can be added for free with your Basys 3!
  • Basys 3 FPGA development board
    • Receive a free USB A to Micro-B cable with your Basys 3 purchase! (Must have the USB cable and Basys 3 in your cart for the discount). 
  • Custom Digilent cardboard box with protective foam

The Basys 3 can be programmed with Digilent's Adept software. Digilent Adept is a unique and powerful solution which allows you to communicate with Digilent system boards and a wide assortment of logic devices. Find out more about Adept here.

To create and modify designs for your Basys 3, you can use Xilinx's Vivado Design Suite. Vivado is a software designed for the synthesis and analysis of HDL designs. The Basys 3 is supported by the free WebPACK edition of the Vivado Design Suite.

Note: Xilinx software tools are not available for download in some countries. Prior to purchasing the Basys 3, please check the supporting software's availability, as it is required for the board's use.

Quickly find what you need to get started and reduce mean time to blink.

All product support including documentation, projects, and the Digilent Forum can be accessed through the product resource center.

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17 Reviews Hide Reviews Show Reviews

  • 5
    BASYS 3

    Posted by Cory Sickles on 13th Sep 2024

    I have found the BASYS 3 to be a good starting point for exploring FPGA coding, as well as being featured enough to handle more complex designs. The built-in VGA and other I/O increases the value of this board.

  • 5
    Power up OK

    Posted by GiLL on 16th Sep 2022

    From power up the GPIO test was working. I loaded my own design without any issue, I'm able to program the FPGA, download the bin file into config memory and exercise all peripherals. I own many Digilent low cost boards, always work for me.

  • 5
    Love this board!

    Posted by Digilent Customer on 8th Sep 2020

    I recently upgraded from a Digilent Spartan-3E board. I appreciate the extra capability of the Artix-7 series over the Spartan-3E. The smaller form factor is also nice. I do miss some of the on-board perhipherals like the dial encoder, Ethernet mags, and LCD display. I had some trouble with Vivado connecting to the board but tech support via the forums was very helpful.

  • 3
    owrks occasionally

    Posted by Digilent Customer on 25th Mar 2020

    If it works, it is a lot of fun. Sadly, sometimes it does not implement the program and if we exchange the board it works. I don't know whether our board is an exception, but it is quite frustrating

  • 5
    Great introductory kit

    Posted by Digilent Customer on 25th Nov 2019

    First time fpga user and it worked great.. Probably not for high end or sophisticated users so read other reviews accordingly. Used it in a class with all new users and everyone liked it and had no difficulty.

  • 2
    switches are already starting to have issues

    Posted by Digilent Customer on 28th Oct 2019

    It's been less than a week and some of the switches are already starting to have issues. I use this board mainly in class to verify proper code function by uploading to the board and testing some binary inputs, and the 5th switch over sometimes send a signal that it's on even when it's in the off position. Someone suggested that I could saulder on a new switch, but that doesn't seem right when this is supposed to be brand new. I'd request that Digilent look at it, but I'm on the quarter system and a few weeks without the board would mean I wouldn't see it again until the class was over, and I constantly need it, so soldering may be my only option if the switch stops working all together.

  • 3
    Lacks multithreaded development environment

    Posted by Christian Riegels on 24th May 2019

    Vivado is a powerful development tool. My university teaches a basic logic design course using Verilog, Vivado IDE, and BASYS3. Towards the end of the quarter, students in the labs spend an unreasonable number of lab hours waiting for simulation results to be processed and for bitstreams to be compiled. These operation are NOT multithreaded using the version of Vivado made available to the class. BASYS3 board is rugged, has tons of flip flops onboard, and VGA out is easily received as straight-wire input to DVI which far a more common port on desktop monitors (though facing phase-out). A purely digital modern graphics output port would be appreciated, dispite the great learning expierence offered by working around the unique problems of VGA (vsync, hsync, etc). One possibility which would preserve BASYS PCB simplicity is you could implement a partial-spec version of a modern digital graphics output port. At the programming-level this would abstract many of the modern interface features away user control and would retain ease of student learning.

  • 5
    Good value for money, target appropriate

    Posted by Raffaele on 21st May 2019

    As others pointed out this is clearly a board for play or pedagogic use. It's expensive and large for builds, it's not a high end one, and it doesn't have a tandem SoaC. If you're after specific or professional use there's better. It gets five stars because it's excellent at what it does: Lots of out of the box I/O, well laid out, simple to use, well documented and based on widely available/documented specs etc. Tends to be a no-hassle experience with the latest Vivado as well. Certainly one of the best boards in the 100-200 segment to learn/teach/play

  • 5
    Awesome board for getting started with fpga(vhdl)

    Posted by B Rabenort on 3rd Dec 2018

    The design suite vivado is really userfriendly and makes programming the board super easy. Within a week i managed to write a VGA driver with 4bit per color RGB. Because of the student priceing i was able to affort to get my own basys 3 board. Only downsides were that the board didnt have a travel case, and that vivado doesn't have a dark theme yet.