The Lattice Semiconductor UART IP core is designed for use in serial communication and supports the RS-232 protocol. The IP shares many characteristics with the NS16450 UART; however, to conserve FPGA resources, the IP is not identical to the NS16450 UART. As a result, it is not source-code compatible, meaning existing driver code for the NS16450 UART does not work on the Lattice UART IP core.
Features
- APB 1.0 interface
- Similarity with the National Semiconductor NS16450 UART with different register addresses
- Optional 16-word-deep FIFO implemented in the UART transmit/receive path when FIFO mode is selected
- Insertion or extraction of standard asynchronous communication bits (start, stop, and parity) to or from the serial data
- Holding and shifting registers, which eliminate the need for precise synchronization between the host (APB interface) and serial data
