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0 pointsSavantIdiot4y ago0 comments

You do realize that RISC-V processors aren't free right? Making an open source ISA is no small feat, but all they really did was help save some megacorporations a little extra money.

Perhaps it will lead to a processor startup, but follow that to its logical conclusion: it takes a huge, profitable company to sustain processor delivery for years. There's a very good reason why only a handful of companies make the top 6 CPU architectures. There's still Synopsys ARC, Renesas, Atmel, PIC just to name a few of RISC-V competitors.

In reality, the Berkeley Four just made a handful of semi companies richer. WDC, NXP, NVIDIA, Microchip, etc. don't have to pay Arm for IP if they use RISC-V. Did that really help anything? Meh.

0 comments

CyberRabbi4y ago

You could argue that the availability of Linux saved countless megacorporations from having to pay Microsoft, IBM, or Sun. Yet the availability of Linux has been a boon to people across the board.

While I agree there is something not right about cutting into ARM’s profits for the benefit of megacorporations, I think that a royalty-free ISA might genuinely be good for civilization despite that in the same way Linux is. It’s tough though, I’m still not fully sold on that opinion.

SavantIdiotOP4y ago

I hear what you are saying, and that is a good point, and I do agree with the: "Why isn't there an open ISA?"

I think the key difference with an OS like Linux and an ISA like RISC-V is that Linux helped literally millions of smart, curious kids get exposed to Unix and tinkering in a OS that wasn't a locked down behemoth: Windows. It changed lives. I don't think it is an exaggeration to overstate the democrization Linux had.

However, I don't see RISC-V touching the world in an analogous way. No kid is gonna tinker with an ISA and fab a CPU. Maybe they will stick it on an FPGA? But it seems less accessible.

Plus RISC-V's biggest propopent, Patterson, isn't really giving the world anything like Linus Torvald did. Linus busted his butt (and still does!) whereas Patterson flies around getting big speaker fees to pump up RISC-V while delegating. Just seems a bit... off? Or its just me.

CyberRabbi4y ago

You raise good points. Linus is a one in a million person... At the same time I do think kids, hobbiests, small startups, and people who can’t afford expensive computers will make use of RISCV on commoditized programmable logic chips like FPGAs. Look at projects like MiSTer, simply not something that was available for hobbiests and free culture advocates 20 years ago. I can see a similar development happening in the computer space. Actually I’m surprised homebrew computers architected around an FPGA haven’t yet become more popular. Maybe as the popularity of RISCV grows we’ll see more of that. Would be great to see a project that implements a risc-v based computer on a de10-nano board as a starting point.

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cunidev4y ago

To be fair, interest around ISAs has never been so high. Now RISC-V workshops ("build your own core") are kind of everywhere, from Udemy to most universities, some of which are even targeted at teenagers.

The resulting RISC-V cores are mostly emulated, but are expanding knowledge of FPGAs immensely as a side effect.

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theon1444y ago

I think you're underestimating the amount of curious kids who are more on the electrical engineering side of things. Who, sure, probably won't get to play with a CPU fab line, but then again that's somewhat like sending kernel contributions is to "tinkering with Linux".

It really is a just question of any level of hobbyist-accessibility (think photo-etching 2 PCBs of less sophistication vs. making a run of 100 perfect 3-layered PCBs in a factory) - and I've seen quite a lot of projects popping up around FPGAs lately that seem to indicate they're starting to approach the Arduino-ish level of approachability (though it's still obviously very far).

RISC-V just might be one of the things on the way to a whole "sillicon-tinkering" scene, so I'm pretty hopeful.

3arn0wl4y ago

Arm deserve all that's coming to them.

A generation ago, their forerunners - Acorn - were happy to take, use and make a profit from the work of American universities, yet when Berkeley asked to be able to use Arm's ISA for research purposes, they got short shrift.

So Berkeley cobbling together a next-generation RISC ISA, and Foundation-ing it out of reach of the same thing happening again, is smart retribution.

3arn0wl4y ago

Sure, RISC-V designs can be open or not... And of course there's always the cost of fabbing.

There're already designs freely available to use though, either as they are, or to build upon.

And there are also now many other companies designing using the ISA; decentralising the production of chips.

But - over and above the revolutionary economics of it - it's being recognised as a good ISA, and RISC-V cores are already being incorporated into consumer electronics.

3arn0wl4y ago

Actually... What they did, ten years ago, was build a much better Computer Engineering course!

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse

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CyberRabbi4y ago

You could argue that the availability of Linux saved countless megacorporations from having to pay Microsoft, IBM, or Sun. Yet the availability of Linux has been a boon to people across the board.

SavantIdiotOP4y ago

I hear what you are saying, and that is a good point, and I do agree with the: "Why isn't there an open ISA?"

However, I don't see RISC-V touching the world in an analogous way. No kid is gonna tinker with an ISA and fab a CPU. Maybe they will stick it on an FPGA? But it seems less accessible.

CyberRabbi4y ago

2 more replies

cunidev4y ago

The resulting RISC-V cores are mostly emulated, but are expanding knowledge of FPGAs immensely as a side effect.

1 more reply

theon1444y ago

RISC-V just might be one of the things on the way to a whole "sillicon-tinkering" scene, so I'm pretty hopeful.

3arn0wl4y ago

Arm deserve all that's coming to them.

So Berkeley cobbling together a next-generation RISC ISA, and Foundation-ing it out of reach of the same thing happening again, is smart retribution.

3arn0wl4y ago

Sure, RISC-V designs can be open or not... And of course there's always the cost of fabbing.

There're already designs freely available to use though, either as they are, or to build upon.

And there are also now many other companies designing using the ISA; decentralising the production of chips.

But - over and above the revolutionary economics of it - it's being recognised as a good ISA, and RISC-V cores are already being incorporated into consumer electronics.

3arn0wl4y ago

Actually... What they did, ten years ago, was build a much better Computer Engineering course!

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse