Chapter 1: Overview for the Arria V Device Family
1–15
Clock Networks and PLL Clock Sources
Clock Networks and PLL Clock Sources
The Arria V clock network architecture is based on Altera’s proven global, quadrant,
and peripheral clock structure, which is supported by dedicated clock input pins and
fractional PLLs. Arria V devices have 16 global clock networks capable of up to
625 MHz operation. The Quartus II software identifies all unused sections of the clock
network and powers them down, which reduces power consumption.
Arria V devices have up to 16 PLLs with 18 output counters per PLL. One fractional
PLL can use up to 18 output counters and two adjacent fractional PLLs share the 18
output counters. You can use fractional PLLs to reduce the number of oscillators
required on your board, as well as reduce the clock pins used in the device by
synthesizing multiple clock frequencies from a single reference clock source. You can
use the PLLs for frequency synthesis, on-chip clock deskew, jitter attenuation,
dynamic phase-shift, zero delay buffers, counters reconfiguration, bandwidth
reconfiguration, programmable output clock duty cycles, PLL cascading, and
reference clock switchover.
Arria V devices use a fractional PLL architecture in addition to the historical integer
PLL. When you use fractional PLL mode, you can use the PLLs for precision
fractional-N frequency synthesis—removing the need for an off-chip reference clock.
Transceiver fractional PLLs, when not used by the Transceiver I/O, can be used as
general-purpose fractional PLLs by the FPGA fabric.
February 2012 Altera Corporation
Arria V Device Handbook
Volume 1: Device Overview and Datasheet