4 ms·

That $1 you pay to other IP companies, like Arm, gives you access to a fully verified design with support from the best engineers in the field. And those compan

That $1 you pay to other IP companies, like Arm, gives you access to a fully verified design with support from the best engineers in the field. And those companies want you to succeed because they will only those royalties if your device reaches the market. By saving that $1 and by not buying IP from other, you will need to invest it in time, in engineers, in know-how, in support, in verification and so on, all by yourself. It might not necessarily be a good cost-benefit situation.

rbanffy 9y ago
> support from the best engineers in the field. I like to point out the difference between having the best engineers money can buy versus having the best engineers no money can buy. People who work in open source software are usually the second kind. I expect open hardware to attract people with the same motivation to push boundaries regardless of any other factor.
nickpsecurity 9y ago
The IP academics keep making on the cheap is always compared to ARM cores in similar class to prove them out. They always come out superior. So, Im doubting best engineers or product. Since they do have good engineers, ARM must be intentionally underdoing their designs to maximize their cash or something. Maybe make a lot of them. Idk how much IP they actually have. I agree it's beneficial that it's already silicon-proven by time most customers get it. The biggest selling point, though, was what ARM themselves said when open ISA topic first came up: the massive ecosystem, esp software and dev tools, makes the licensing worth the money. Im not sure how true that is. Probably varies a lot depending on who is using it but might be true for many. RISC-V needs to get its ecosystem super-strong to challenge ARM in general sense on top of pre-proven IP customers can trust. Ecosystem is the bigger issue, though.

4 ms·

That $1 you pay to other IP companies, like Arm, gives you access to a fully verified design with support from the best engineers in the field. And those compan

by pedroaraujo 9y ago

rbanffy 9y ago
> support from the best engineers in the field. I like to point out the difference between having the best engineers money can buy versus having the best engineers no money can buy. People who work in open source software are usually the second kind. I expect open hardware to attract people with the same motivation to push boundaries regardless of any other factor.
nickpsecurity 9y ago
The IP academics keep making on the cheap is always compared to ARM cores in similar class to prove them out. They always come out superior. So, Im doubting best engineers or product. Since they do have good engineers, ARM must be intentionally underdoing their designs to maximize their cash or something. Maybe make a lot of them. Idk how much IP they actually have. I agree it's beneficial that it's already silicon-proven by time most customers get it. The biggest selling point, though, was what ARM themselves said when open ISA topic first came up: the massive ecosystem, esp software and dev tools, makes the licensing worth the money. Im not sure how true that is. Probably varies a lot depending on who is using it but might be true for many. RISC-V needs to get its ecosystem super-strong to challenge ARM in general sense on top of pre-proven IP customers can trust. Ecosystem is the bigger issue, though.