Implementing Real-Time Low-Power Audio Effect with FPGA

Abstract

In this paper, a low-power, fast time-to-market, field programmable gate array (FPGA)-based audio effect is designed from the standard settings used by a musician in virtual studio technology (VST) to provide harsh and heavy distortion for bass guitar's sound. The FPGA only costs around 29 US dollars, and including the research time, it took less than 20 days to design the system from scratch up to programming the hardware. The FPGA itself only consumes 41 mW, and thus the system could be powered by a 9 V alkaline battery. This device can update its configuration with a USB cable, enabling aftermarket configuration update and variation.