Hackaday starts The FPGA Chronicles series on the Tang Nano 20K
On 28 September 2026 Al Williams opened The FPGA Chronicles on Hackaday: an updated FPGA Bootcamp built around the Sipeed Tang Nano 20K board with a GOWIN GW2AR-18 FPGA.
Summary
Hackaday started The FPGA Chronicles, an updated FPGA Bootcamp on the Tang Nano 20K, on 2026-09-28.
Overview
Hackaday published the first article of The FPGA Chronicles on 28 September 2026. Author Al Williams earlier ran an FPGA Bootcamp on Hackaday.io; he writes that much of it still applies, but the hardware is dated. The new series moves the material to the inexpensive Tang Nano 20K, with perhaps a few excursions into other FPGAs.
The opening article explains why and when an FPGA is needed, describes the board and its GOWIN GW2AR-LV18QN88C8/I7 chip, lists the basic workflow from HDL to bitstream and shows a minimal Verilog example with two switches and two LEDs together with the pin constraint file. It ends with the author's notes on getting the GOWIN IDE and the programmer to work on Linux.
The Sipeed wiki confirms the key numbers: 20736 LUT4, 15552 flip-flops, 48 18x18 multipliers and a 32-bit SDR SDRAM of 64M bits, which is the 8 Mbyte the article mentions. The board also has an onboard BL616 debugger with JTAG and UART, an HDMI interface, a 40-pin RGB LCD connector and a TF card slot.
According to the article, the next parts will cover open-source tools, IP, synchronous logic and the built-in logic analyzer. At the time of checking, the series page on Hackaday lists only this one article.
Verified facts
Hackaday published the article on 2026-09-28 by Al Williams. Source: https://hackaday.com/2026/09/28/the-fpga-chronicles-exploring-the-tang-nano-20k/. Checked: 2026-10-02. Confidence: 5/5.
GW2AR-LV18QN88C8/I7: 20736 LUT4, 15552 flip-flops, 48 multipliers, 32-bit SDR SDRAM 64M bits. Source: https://wiki.sipeed.com/hardware/en/tang/tang-nano-20k/nano-20k.html. Checked: 2026-10-02. Confidence: 5/5.
Later parts will cover open-source tools, IP, synchronous logic and the logic analyzer. Source: https://hackaday.com/2026/09/28/the-fpga-chronicles-exploring-the-tang-nano-20k/. Checked: 2026-10-02. Confidence: 5/5.
Engineering benefit
The article and the Sipeed wiki together give a checked set of board resources (LUT4, flip-flops, multipliers, SDRAM, onboard debugger) that a beginner needs when planning a first design. Source: https://wiki.sipeed.com/hardware/en/tang/tang-nano-20k/nano-20k.html. Checked: 2026-10-02. Confidence: 4/5.
The article names the full workflow (HDL, top block, constraints, synthesis, place and route, bitstream) and shows a constraint file for the Tang Nano 20K pins. Source: https://hackaday.com/2026/09/28/the-fpga-chronicles-exploring-the-tang-nano-20k/. Checked: 2026-10-02. Confidence: 5/5.
Commercial benefit
The author describes the Tang Nano 20K as an inexpensive board; no price is given in the article, so cost planning still needs a current offer from a seller. The source gives no price or availability. Source: https://hackaday.com/2026/09/28/the-fpga-chronicles-exploring-the-tang-nano-20k/. Checked: 2026-10-02. Confidence: 3/5.
Community benefit
The author invites discussion of the series on the Hackaday Discord server and links the earlier FPGA Bootcamp 0 course, which uses a free tool in the browser and no FPGA. Source: https://hackaday.com/2026/09/28/the-fpga-chronicles-exploring-the-tang-nano-20k/. Checked: 2026-10-02. Confidence: 5/5.
Critical review
Only the first article is out and the series page lists one article, so the promised parts on open-source tools, IP and the logic analyzer have no dates. Source: https://hackaday.com/2026/09/28/the-fpga-chronicles-exploring-the-tang-nano-20k/. Checked: 2026-10-02. Confidence: 4/5.
The Linux fixes in the article (library paths, a udev rule for the FTDI driver) are the author's own and he writes that they may or may not help on other systems. Source: https://hackaday.com/2026/09/28/the-fpga-chronicles-exploring-the-tang-nano-20k/. Checked: 2026-10-02. Confidence: 5/5.
The article's clock-speed remark for the chip depends on design and routing and is not a measured figure, so this item does not repeat it. Source: https://hackaday.com/2026/09/28/the-fpga-chronicles-exploring-the-tang-nano-20k/. Checked: 2026-10-02. Confidence: 5/5.
The chip figures are confirmed by two independent pages (the article and the vendor wiki), so the news can state them with confidence. Source: https://wiki.sipeed.com/hardware/en/tang/tang-nano-20k/nano-20k.html. Checked: 2026-10-02. Confidence: 5/5.
Practical recommendations
The site has the board card /boards/sipeed/tang-nano-20k and the learning track /kb/tang-nano-20k-learning-track, which collects the official documentation, the GOWIN IDE route and the open-source route in one order.
Start with the two-switch, two-LED example from the article before attempting anything with HDMI: an LED is easier to debug because it does not need a monitor.
Official links
Hackaday: The FPGA Chronicles: Exploring The Tang Nano 20K
Hackaday: FPGA Chronicles series
Evidence
Hackaday published "The FPGA Chronicles: Exploring The Tang Nano 20K" by Al Williams on 2026-09-28. Source: https://hackaday.com/2026/09/28/the-fpga-chronicles-exploring-the-tang-nano-20k/. Checked: 2026-10-02.
The author says the earlier FPGA Bootcamp on Hackaday.io still mostly applies but its hardware is dated, so he is updating it around the Tang Nano 20K and its GOWIN GW2AR-18 FPGA, with perhaps a few excursions into other FPGAs. Source: https://hackaday.com/2026/09/28/the-fpga-chronicles-exploring-the-tang-nano-20k/. Checked: 2026-10-02.
The article gives the board FPGA as GOWIN GW2AR-LV18QN88C8/I7 with 20,736 four-input LUTs and 15,552 flip-flops, plus an 8 Mbyte 32-bit SDR SDRAM in the package and 48 18x18 multipliers. Source: https://hackaday.com/2026/09/28/the-fpga-chronicles-exploring-the-tang-nano-20k/. Checked: 2026-10-02.
The Sipeed wiki parameter table lists the same chip GW2AR-LV18QN88C8/I7, 20736 LUT4, 15552 flip-flops, 48 18x18 multipliers and 32-bit SDR SDRAM of 64M bits (8 Mbyte). Source: https://wiki.sipeed.com/hardware/en/tang/tang-nano-20k/nano-20k.html. Checked: 2026-10-02.
The Sipeed wiki lists an onboard BL616 debugger (JTAG, USB-to-UART, USB-to-SPI), an HDMI interface, a 40-pin RGB LCD connector, a TF card slot and 64 Mbit flash for the bitstream. Source: https://wiki.sipeed.com/hardware/en/tang/tang-nano-20k/nano-20k.html. Checked: 2026-10-02.
The first article covers the basic FPGA workflow (HDL, top block, constraints, synthesis, place and route, bitstream), a small Verilog example with two switches and two LEDs, and notes on installing the GOWIN IDE on Linux. Source: https://hackaday.com/2026/09/28/the-fpga-chronicles-exploring-the-tang-nano-20k/. Checked: 2026-10-02.
The author says later articles will cover open-source tools, IP, synchronous logic and the built-in logic analyzer. Source: https://hackaday.com/2026/09/28/the-fpga-chronicles-exploring-the-tang-nano-20k/. Checked: 2026-10-02.
The Hackaday series list for FPGA Chronicles currently shows this one article. Source: https://hackaday.com/2026/09/28/the-fpga-chronicles-exploring-the-tang-nano-20k/. Checked: 2026-10-02.