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I suspect most of RISC-V development is more towards moving away from western controlled ISA's that can be sanctioned for any reason. Points about avoid shortag
by worldofmatthew 4y ago
I suspect most of RISC-V development is more towards moving away from western controlled ISA's that can be sanctioned for any reason. Points about avoid shortages from any fab being allowed to fabricate RISC-V CPUs is just the "cherry on top".
- packetlost 4y agoMaybe. It's not like sanctioned countries tend give a shit about copyright law, so how would sanctions prevent the use of something they already know how to make and use? I'm just not convinced this idea holds any water.
- worldofmatthew 4y agoNot breaking copyright makes it easier for a eastern block to form around RISC-V fabrication.
- pdimitar 4y agoCan you explain how? I'm not seeing it.
- fakeslimshady 4y ago
- conradev 4y agoI don’t know if sanctions are the reason, but moving away from foreign-controlled IP is certainly a thing. Chinese companies make STM32 clones (even fixing the errata in the original): https://hackaday.com/2020/10/22/stm32-clones-the-good-the-bad-and-the-ugly/ https://hackaday.com/2020/10/22/stm32-clones-the-good-the-ba...
- justahuman74 4y agoI think it's more about a potential future usage of ARM in a sanctions package. Somewhat similar to how Hauwai was was hit with a list of narrow prohibitions like access to the android store. Having an openly implementable ISA is just one less thing to worry about
- oneplane 4y agoI doubt that matters considering China stole a complete copy of ARM (the company) and has already released new IP under their rebranded name.
- pclmulqdq 4y agoThe stolen architectures cannot be legitimately sold outside of China, due to patents held by ARM ltd. RISC-V avoids these headaches.
- oneplane 4y agoIndeed, but conversely, China will have access to ARM no matter what. This also means that we can sanction all we want, they locally have the fabs and IP to create ARM, RISC-V, MIPS and even x86 CPUs (and they are already doing all of that). Granted, their fabs can't do top-of-the-line lithography (yet?) but since they have already created 64-core ARM server CPUs and some custom AI silicon they can get horizontally scaled performance regardless. This is of course their focus: make sure they can make computers and related equipment domestically no matter what.
- snvzz 4y agoThey do have access to ARM, sure. But they also have access to RISC-V, which is technically superior and free of the troubles associated with ARM.
- SassyThrowaway 4y agoWhat is superior about RISC V technically?
- snvzz 4y agoGigadevices GD32 has a successor in GD32V, which is the same but RISC-V based.
- spamizbad 4y agoIf you're manufacturing chips under sanctions your most difficult finds are going to be the manufacturing equipment, expertise, and raw materials to produce the chips. It's not going to be an ISA - there have been a litany of "open" ISAs and well-documented industry standard ones you're likely going to do unlicensed copies of. Secondary challenge here, going beyond the ISA, are pre-defined blocks of functionality already implemented (eg: an ethernet controller, internal CPU busses, memory controllers, etc). Even in the RISC-V world many of these are commercial and require a license.
- vbezhenar 4y agoYou want to have lots of software for your computer. Like Linux, Chromium, compilers, JIT, etc. It reduces the number of options.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- notsapiensatall 4y agoMost hardware is not field-programmable. You can't update a CPU's DDR3 PHY to DDR4, or switch to DDR3L if your needs change. The single-purpose nature of ASICs and hardware blocks is what makes them fast and power-efficient.
- nomel 4y agoYeap! I've worked with analog and digital chip designers, along with some digital designers that now work on fundamental IP for an FPGA company. One thing they all had in common was "we avoid all abstractions". It's all as direct as possible. You don't use extra silicon to appease some tidy block diagram that makes the problem easier to reason about, because the silicon isn't made for humans to reason about, it's made for holes and electrons to do their thing!
- mrweasel 4y agoI doubt that countries like Iran, North Korean and now Russia care much about the legality of implementing a ARM processor without a license. Or did you mean more in terms of a chip that can be sold to those countries without risk? In that case you just sacrion the sale of the equipment required to make the chip, or block the manufacturer from your markets.
- throwaway4good 4y agoYes. The (commercial) interest in riscv comes from China and is driven by the us china tech war. The riscv foundation moved to Switzerland as a reaction to the initial round of Huawei sanctions. You will find Chinese companies at forefront of riscv development (ie Alibaba) and Huawei harmonyos supports riscv. I don’t know why the article doesn’t mention this aspect.
- tyingq 4y agoWestern Digital was probably more excited about the no-royalties model.