I am working for a semi-conductor company. Now, my assignment is to design IEEE802.11ac PHY layer algorithm.
However, the situation of theoretical simulation is very different from that of pratical implementation in RTL. In real circuit, for example, we have to consider about the fixed point, latency and so on. Hence, the performances between them are very different.
Thereby, I wanna know that how to simulate the PHY layer system can optimally reflect the performance of the real-circuit implementation. Specially, which software, such as Matlab, Python, C and so on, is the best choice you think.
If you will simulate a circuit of a WiFi transceiver then you will need software like pspice. However, if you will simulate a WiFi transceiver while operating in the network you will probably need to resort to network software packages like OPNET in which you can simulate a channel and assume some statistical parameters about the data communicated. In any case, you will need C to design code for particularities of your device in OPNET. MATLAB is a powerful package, but surely not for circuit level simulation. Generally, it will be very complex and impractical to resort to a stand alone high level language such as Python to do complex simulations. Thanks. @AlDmour.
There is an open source Java-based 802.11ac simulator available now, which is a companion to a book on 802.11ac. Links to the simulator and the book are attached. I haven't tried it myself so not sure about how good it is, but it sounds promising.
http://sourceforge.net/projects/hewsimulator/
http://www.amazon.com/IEEE-802-11ac-analysis-Jean-Pierre-Rouzic/dp/1492338370
Another solution is to use the GNU Radio toolkit and write your algorithm in Python. Link to the toolkit is attached.
If you are looking to simulate the logic on the digital circuit on the chip, defined by HDL code, you can use Modelsim from Mentor Graphics.
My agreement is with Mr. Ismat Aldmour and Mr. Wheberth Dias. Since you want to analyze circuit behaviour , any circuit simulation tool like pSpice, ModelSim, VHDL for FPGA implementation and may be ADS for RF circuit simulations would be useful. MATLAB is useful for PHY layer waveform simulations and discrete event simulations. Implementing circuit simulation in MATLAB/SIMULINK would involve deriving mathematical models for all components and integrating them / simulating using behaviour models. It may be a tedious process and your output accuracy is only as good as the model you use. Whereas the circuit simulation tools will have library files based on manufacturer's data sheet for the components and hence to a large extent result in near accurate results.
a) Start with designing your golden model in Matlab, Simulink or System-C
b) Restrict your design to to fixed-point by using the appropriate definitions of variables with your design in any of these tools
c) Translate it to an architecture (or compile from System C if you have the tools available) and make the description in HDL.
d) Perform cosimulation between your model and VHDL using modelsim and your chosen platform
e) Guarantee that your final HDL models produces the same results than your fixed-point golden model and fix any bug.
f) Test your HDL in an FPGA platform provided by some FPGA vendor with the environment to your design already provided and tested
g) Compile your design by means of Synopsis and validate it with Cadence
h) Send your chip to fabrication
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