6 ms·

What is RISC-V, and why we're unlocking its potential

96 points by rwmj 3y ago

ndsipa_pomu 3y ago
[flagged]
hashtag-til 3y ago
Not really sure what’s the advantage of switching from whatever you have today (ARM?), to a qualcomm IP. Qualcomm is historycally a quite shitty partner to have. Nobody is going to give the secret sauce for free. Also these AI/ML use cases are just some marketing bs, not really grounded by anything really. There are plenty of ISAs you can find freely available today (Open sparc anyone?). The problem is fragmentation…
- ndsipa_pomu 3y ago
  RISC-V is not tied to Qualcomm, so you can either choose a different partner or do it all yourself if you've got the necessary skills and resources. > This open ISA provides designers and developers with greater control over their computing environments, allowing them to fine-tune their systems without relying on third parties or incurring additional license fees associated with proprietary architectures.
  - squarefoot 3y ago
    Also, having competition in the field benefits everyone, including those who wouldn't switch anyway.
  - hashtag-til 3y ago
    That’s very aspirational, but hardly backed by any reference these days.
    - Moto7451 3y ago
      Agreed, especially given their position in ARM, a ubiquitous and easy to license IP. The lock in will come from the GPU, accelerator/coprocessor, and other IPs that will lead to Qualcomm/other large vendor lock in.
    - ndsipa_pomu 3y ago
      I don't follow what you mean. You can purchase SiFive RISC-V chips.
      - themiddleupper 3y ago
        Are they open source?
        ndsipa_pomu 3y ago
        I believe so. https://www.sifive.com/press/sifive-launches-industrys-first-open-source-risc-v-soc https://www.sifive.com/press/sifive-launches-industrys-first... https://github.com/sifive https://github.com/sifive
        jlokier 3y ago
        I believe SiFive's CPUs and chip designs are not open source generally, although they do open source a lot of related things such as software, specifications, tools. I looked at their GitHub and didn't find any CPUs in there, though there are a lot of repos. Here's an interesting take on what someone thinks "open source" means in this context: gjsman-1000 wrote: Open source refers solely to the software side of things in these groups and types of projects. Thus, all of the drivers and software you need to use the SiFive is open source and thus you can say it is an open source design. However, it is not an "open hardware" design in that the IP used to design the chip is not released. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25762114 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25762114 I personally don't think of closed chip designs with open software and specifications as open source chips. That would be like saying Intel and AMD x86s are open source. Though to be fair to those companies, their CPU programming models are much more open than their FPGA programming models, which requires proprietary software and secret specifications to program them at all.
  - Geezus_42 3y ago
    Yes, but how long until Qualcomm, and whoever else, builds proprietary add-on instruction sets that become SOB and lock people in?
    - rwmj 3y ago
      It's entirely the point of the RISC-V custom extension space that Qualcomm are allowed to do this. It's certainly a risk that software could get locked in to using these custom extensions, but it's also very easy to tell if software is using those extensions from simple examination of the opcodes. For those interested, check the bottom byte[*] of each instruction for: x000 10xx custom-0 x010 10xx custom-1 x101 10xx custom-2 x111 10xx custom-3 [*] Where "bottom byte" is actually the first byte since instructions are always stored little endian. Edit: To be clear and avoid confusion, RISC-V has two sorts of extensions, the custom vendor-specific extension space that I'm talking about here, and the RVI standard extensions which I'm not talking about.
      - znpy 3y ago
        > software could get locked in to using these custom extensions the question arises: can such extensions be patented? we've seen already that APIs cannot get patented (see the Oracle vs Google litigation). If Qualcomm was to develop a set of extension, but other players in the risc-v space could implement some equivalent that's ISA/binary compatible... I wouldn't see any issue with that. Am I being too optimistic ?
        colejohnson66 3y ago
        IANAL, but yes, ISA extensions can be patented. For example, the x86-64 extension ("Long Mode") was created by AMD, and Intel had to pay to license it.[0] Those patents expired a few years ago, allowing Microsoft and Apple to write x86-64 to ARM translators freely. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X86-64#Licensing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X86-64#Licensing
        rwmj 3y ago
        RISC-V has two sorts of extensions. The custom extensions I mentioned in my post above are vendor-specific and they can do what they want, patent them, keep them secret, whatever. However the standard extensions which go through ratification by RISC-V International and are meant to be implemented by anyone must have a royalty-free patent grant (see: https://riscv.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/RISC-V-Amended-Internal-Regulations-APPROVED-2022-Feb-17.pdf https://riscv.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/RISC-V-Amended-...)
  - fidotron 3y ago
    In fairness using Qualcomm for purposes other than mobile modem integration is a niche pursuit for ARM windows machines and Meta Quest VR. Their CPU implementations never recovered from the 64 bit transition that wrong footed them completely. As the parent alluded to, if there is a problem in the Android ecosystem you will almost certainly find either Qualcomm or Google in the middle of it.
  - ilyt 3y ago
    > RISC-V is not tied to Qualcomm, so you can either choose a different partner or do it all yourself if you've got the necessary skills and resources. ISA is the least important part in CPU. The hard part is having all drivers for the peripherals given chip has and knowing most of the chinese vendors it's straight to landfill after few years unless something becomes so popular community RE it.
    - ndsipa_pomu 3y ago
      > ISA is the least important part in CPU It is essential though, so it's an important step towards having entirely open CPUs
      - ilyt 3y ago
        Proprietary ISA with open peripherals would be FAR better than other way around. Frankly the ISA part is easiest to change from OS kernel perspective. If "open" ISA comes with a bunch of blobs it's essentially exactly same situation as using ARM chip.
        ndsipa_pomu 3y ago
        There's a HN link to https://pineapple-one.github.io/ https://pineapple-one.github.io/ on the front-page now. Is that of interest?
- TradingPlaces 3y ago
  The advantage is that ARM is trying to change their license and royalty structure and are currently suing Qualcomm. https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/64938776/arm-ltd-v-qualcomm-inc/ https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/64938776/arm-ltd-v-qual...
  - hashtag-til 3y ago
    You mean advantage for who? That their quarrel, not a trend.
    - rwmj 3y ago
      If ARM are going to attack Qualcomm, who else will they go for? Particularly since they now need to justify their very high stock price. With RISC-V you have a clear license (BSD) which lets you do what you want, now and in the future.
      - klelatti 3y ago
        Qualcomm took the first step in this case by trying to sell Nuvia derived designs under their own license agreement. Whoever wins it’s not really Arm going on the ‘attack’ if there is a reasonable case that the license has been breached.
        TradingPlaces 3y ago
        We have no visibility into either contract at the center of this case. I’m holding off judgement until we understand Qualcomm’s architecture license, and the assignment clause in Nuvia's. I will only say that suing a 10% customer is, generally speaking, a terrible idea.
        klelatti 3y ago
        > a terrible idea Well you’re not really holding off judgment then! It’s also a terrible idea to let big customers breach their contracts but as you say we haven’t seen the contracts concerned.
- phkahler 3y ago
  >> There are plenty of ISAs you can find freely available today (Open sparc anyone?). The problem is fragmentation… If by "fragmentation" you mean lack of industry-wide support, then you've answered your own question as to why RISC-V. Most Debian packages can run on it. There is even an Android port to RISC-V. Outside x86 and ARM, the next best supported ISA is RISC-V. Unrelated: why do they call the instruction set an architecture or ISA?
  - acdha 3y ago
    Strictly speaking an instruction set doesn’t include things like the memory model which you need to know to be able to port code. For example, Apple had to add an extension to their ARM chips which makes stronger guarantees about the order in which memory is written because x86 Mac apps might have dependencies on that which their developers hadn’t been aware of.
    - snvzz 3y ago
      >Strictly speaking an instruction set doesn’t include things like the memory model which you need to know to be able to port code. Very strictly speaking, to the point where it's true but irrelevant. RISC-V does have specifications for memory models: RVWMO and Ztso. They are both ratified.
      - acdha 3y ago
        Oh, apologies if it sounded like I was trying to say RISC-V doesn't - I was only trying to explain why we use the term “instruction set architecture” as opposed to just “instruction set”.
        snvzz 3y ago
        Because the parent was talking about fragmentation, it does not hurt to ensure it is understood that the memory model _is_ standardized in RISC-V.
  - brucehoult 3y ago
- dkjaudyeqooe 3y ago
  ARM is no saint either. The problem is that when you have total control over the key IP at some point you become prone to extracting more money out of your customers through various forms of coercion. The advantage of moving to RISC-V is that no one owns it and you can always leave your IP vendor for another one. Because RISC-V is an attractive ISA it's having an anti-fragmentation effect, creating a popular standard and an industry around it.
MuffinFlavored 3y ago
aren’t all instruction sets slightly different ways of achieving the same thing at a low level? 8, 16, 32, 64 bit mov + add + sub + load + store. and/or/not/xor, blah blah blah obviously it gets way more complex. just curious “unlocking its potential” i thought the primary benefit of risc-v is how easy it is to implement since it never gets into the more complex messiness that’s modern x86_64 and all of its extensions
- rwmj 3y ago
  For whatever reason we've decided to allow companies to copyright and patent instruction sets, which means in practice it's completely forbidden to make your own x86-compatible processor, and for ARM you'd better negotiate a license fee up front. RISC-V is permissionless, you just grab the specs and start implementing (or more likely, grab a free core off Github and start modifying it). So that's the difference here. For extensions, RISC-V supports those in a somewhat more structured way. There's both an open process for ratifying standard extensions, and a reserved space for your own custom extensions.
  - RetroTechie 3y ago
    Patents covering the earliest x86 cpus have long expired. Copyrights cover documentation, and may cover the names of instructions. But creating something that's interoperable with x86, and doesn't violate those copyrights, should be considered fair use. In the same line of copyrighted APIs vs. competing implementations of said APIs. Basically: make cpu that eats binary code of >20y old x86 cpu, use new names for instructions, and write your own documentation. But of course recent, high performance x86 cpus are still covered by many patents. So what's legal are competing implementations of x86 cpus released ~20y ago, not using performance enhancing technology covered by still-valid patents. To do what? No market for those. Not to mention Intel & AMD have legal teams that could make the going tough for anyone trying to do so. Even if legally allowed. A big advantage for RISC-V is being a clean slate ISA, meaning its design takes into account many issues that were bolted on ad-hoc in other ISAs (32/64 bit, extensions, virtualization, compact instructions, etc). And being a modular design, you don't pay the power/area cost if you just need a simple core.
kwanbix 3y ago
What is crazy is how Apple was able to steal the thunder from all, intel, amd, qualcomm, etc. I really wish the PC (non-apple) world steps up, because I don't like macOS at all, and I don't like to pay the Apple prices either.
- neolefty 3y ago
  It is so crazy how good they are. I love my Apple hardware (M1 Max, four external displays FTW) and tolerate my Apple software (Mac OS).
  - dartos 3y ago
    This. Apple just makes the physically best laptops
    - kwanbix 3y ago
      Cannot disagree more. ThinkPads are the best laptops (not counting the M1/M2 CPU).
      - dartos 3y ago
        I had a Lenovo think pad in 2013 for school. Carried it all over campus for 1 year. So unless their build quality is entirely different nowadays, I’ll never go near another thinkpad It started literally falling apart in 6 months. One of the usb ports stopped working, the disc tray was stuck, the bottom left of the trackpad was sunken in, and the whole laptop felt cheap and was plastic. A ton of flex in the whole thing. The worst experience I had with an aluminum mac was dropping it while open and having the screen shatter.
        conkeisterdoor 3y ago
        I've had a ThinkPad 13 2G for about 6 years and it's still working fine, but it most likely didn't get the same level of use/wear that yours did. It's a shame that IBM sold its PC business to Lenovo. Maybe it's just the model I have, but Lenovo's ThinkPads feel so much worse in quality than IBM's ThinkPads. I probably won't get another one when the time comes to replace mine.
klelatti 3y ago
> For a product developer, it eliminates the issue of being tied to the limited portfolio of cores available from a proprietary ISA. Hmmm this is the same Qualcomm that had an Arm architecture license for years and ended up using off the shelf Arm cores?
- chalst 3y ago
  It still has an Arm license, but the outcome of the lawsuit against Qualcomm last year was that Qualcomm could not use the Nuvia design, which used Arm technology, on the idea that Qualcomm did not get the same rights as Nuvia had to use Arm’s designs from their takeover of Nuvia.
  - wyldfire 3y ago
    I'm pretty sure you're mistaken and those were only ARM's claims in their suit filed last year. The trial was set to begin on the 23rd. Not sure what the date is now. But you can see depositions being taken in August [1]. [1] https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/64938776/arm-ltd-v-qualcomm-inc/ https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/64938776/arm-ltd-v-qual...
  - klelatti 3y ago
    > on the idea that Qualcomm did not get the same rights as Nuvia had to use Arm’s designs The point being that they wanted the rights Nuvia had but without the obligations that Nuvia license implies - most specifically on fees. And yes they have an architecture license but no the lawsuit is still open.
- wyldfire 3y ago
  ... and is now (again) an architectural licensee.
chalst 3y ago
This is a direct consequence of the lawsuit by Arm that prevented Qualcomm from using the Nuvia design in its hardware.
ilyt 3y ago
> We’re investing in RISC-V: Here’s why Coz we don't want to pay for licensing > and what’s in it for you The fun of porting and/or testing everything! Aren't you happy ? Oh, and we will not upstream our drivers as usual so your devices will be landfill after 4 years as usual
- wyldfire 3y ago
  > Oh, and we will not upstream our drivers as usual so your devices will be landfill after 4 years as usual This is not genuine argument. Check the sources at kernel.org and you will see tons of Qualcomm drivers upstreamed by Qualcomm. Did Qualcomm do a bad job w upstreaming, for years? yes, they did. Are they improving? yes, IMO they are. disclaimer: Qualcomm employee.
  - fooker 3y ago
    You start by saying it isn’t a genuine argument and then admit Qualcomm has been bad at this for a while..
    - wyldfire 3y ago
      "we will not" would suggest that any drivers that are present are reverse engineered which is not the case. "Linux 6.2 Expands Support For More Qualcomm Snapdragon SoCs, Apple M1 Pro/Ultra/Max" https://www.phoronix.com/news/Linux-6.2-Arm-SoC-Updates https://www.phoronix.com/news/Linux-6.2-Arm-SoC-Updates "Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 Patches Already Surfacing For The Linux Kernel" https://www.phoronix.com/news/Snapdragon-8-Gen-2-Linux https://www.phoronix.com/news/Snapdragon-8-Gen-2-Linux "Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 Sees Timely Support With The Mainline Linux 5.17 Kernel" https://www.phoronix.com/news/Linux-5.17-Arm https://www.phoronix.com/news/Linux-5.17-Arm
      - AnthonyMouse 3y ago
        Wait, so can you actually install a Linux distribution or stock Android with a mainline kernel on any of these devices?
themiddleupper 3y ago
I believe most of the value in the ISA being open source would be captured by hyperscalars and companies like Qualcomm. With companies like Qualcomm involved, I am afraid they are going to do the whole embrace, extend and extinguish strategy.

96 points by rwmj 3y ago

[flagged]

Not really sure what’s the advantage of switching from whatever you have today (ARM?), to a qualcomm IP. Qualcomm is historycally a quite shitty partner to have. Nobody is going to give the secret sauce for free. Also these AI/ML use cases are just some marketing bs, not really grounded by anything really. There are plenty of ISAs you can find freely available today (Open sparc anyone?). The problem is fragmentation…

ndsipa_pomu 3y ago
RISC-V is not tied to Qualcomm, so you can either choose a different partner or do it all yourself if you've got the necessary skills and resources. > This open ISA provides designers and developers with greater control over their computing environments, allowing them to fine-tune their systems without relying on third parties or incurring additional license fees associated with proprietary architectures.
- squarefoot 3y ago
  Also, having competition in the field benefits everyone, including those who wouldn't switch anyway.
- hashtag-til 3y ago
  That’s very aspirational, but hardly backed by any reference these days.
  - Moto7451 3y ago
    Agreed, especially given their position in ARM, a ubiquitous and easy to license IP. The lock in will come from the GPU, accelerator/coprocessor, and other IPs that will lead to Qualcomm/other large vendor lock in.
  - ndsipa_pomu 3y ago
    I don't follow what you mean. You can purchase SiFive RISC-V chips.
    - themiddleupper 3y ago
      Are they open source?
      - ndsipa_pomu 3y ago
        I believe so. https://www.sifive.com/press/sifive-launches-industrys-first-open-source-risc-v-soc https://www.sifive.com/press/sifive-launches-industrys-first... https://github.com/sifive https://github.com/sifive
      - jlokier 3y ago
        I believe SiFive's CPUs and chip designs are not open source generally, although they do open source a lot of related things such as software, specifications, tools. I looked at their GitHub and didn't find any CPUs in there, though there are a lot of repos. Here's an interesting take on what someone thinks "open source" means in this context: gjsman-1000 wrote: Open source refers solely to the software side of things in these groups and types of projects. Thus, all of the drivers and software you need to use the SiFive is open source and thus you can say it is an open source design. However, it is not an "open hardware" design in that the IP used to design the chip is not released. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25762114 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25762114 I personally don't think of closed chip designs with open software and specifications as open source chips. That would be like saying Intel and AMD x86s are open source. Though to be fair to those companies, their CPU programming models are much more open than their FPGA programming models, which requires proprietary software and secret specifications to program them at all.
- Geezus_42 3y ago
  Yes, but how long until Qualcomm, and whoever else, builds proprietary add-on instruction sets that become SOB and lock people in?
  - rwmj 3y ago
    It's entirely the point of the RISC-V custom extension space that Qualcomm are allowed to do this. It's certainly a risk that software could get locked in to using these custom extensions, but it's also very easy to tell if software is using those extensions from simple examination of the opcodes. For those interested, check the bottom byte[*] of each instruction for: x000 10xx custom-0 x010 10xx custom-1 x101 10xx custom-2 x111 10xx custom-3 [*] Where "bottom byte" is actually the first byte since instructions are always stored little endian. Edit: To be clear and avoid confusion, RISC-V has two sorts of extensions, the custom vendor-specific extension space that I'm talking about here, and the RVI standard extensions which I'm not talking about.
    - znpy 3y ago
      > software could get locked in to using these custom extensions the question arises: can such extensions be patented? we've seen already that APIs cannot get patented (see the Oracle vs Google litigation). If Qualcomm was to develop a set of extension, but other players in the risc-v space could implement some equivalent that's ISA/binary compatible... I wouldn't see any issue with that. Am I being too optimistic ?
      - colejohnson66 3y ago
        IANAL, but yes, ISA extensions can be patented. For example, the x86-64 extension ("Long Mode") was created by AMD, and Intel had to pay to license it.[0] Those patents expired a few years ago, allowing Microsoft and Apple to write x86-64 to ARM translators freely. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X86-64#Licensing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X86-64#Licensing
      - rwmj 3y ago
        RISC-V has two sorts of extensions. The custom extensions I mentioned in my post above are vendor-specific and they can do what they want, patent them, keep them secret, whatever. However the standard extensions which go through ratification by RISC-V International and are meant to be implemented by anyone must have a royalty-free patent grant (see: https://riscv.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/RISC-V-Amended-Internal-Regulations-APPROVED-2022-Feb-17.pdf https://riscv.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/RISC-V-Amended-...)
- fidotron 3y ago
  In fairness using Qualcomm for purposes other than mobile modem integration is a niche pursuit for ARM windows machines and Meta Quest VR. Their CPU implementations never recovered from the 64 bit transition that wrong footed them completely. As the parent alluded to, if there is a problem in the Android ecosystem you will almost certainly find either Qualcomm or Google in the middle of it.
- ilyt 3y ago
  > RISC-V is not tied to Qualcomm, so you can either choose a different partner or do it all yourself if you've got the necessary skills and resources. ISA is the least important part in CPU. The hard part is having all drivers for the peripherals given chip has and knowing most of the chinese vendors it's straight to landfill after few years unless something becomes so popular community RE it.
  - ndsipa_pomu 3y ago
    > ISA is the least important part in CPU It is essential though, so it's an important step towards having entirely open CPUs
    - ilyt 3y ago
      Proprietary ISA with open peripherals would be FAR better than other way around. Frankly the ISA part is easiest to change from OS kernel perspective. If "open" ISA comes with a bunch of blobs it's essentially exactly same situation as using ARM chip.
      - ndsipa_pomu 3y ago
        There's a HN link to https://pineapple-one.github.io/ https://pineapple-one.github.io/ on the front-page now. Is that of interest?
TradingPlaces 3y ago
The advantage is that ARM is trying to change their license and royalty structure and are currently suing Qualcomm. https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/64938776/arm-ltd-v-qualcomm-inc/ https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/64938776/arm-ltd-v-qual...
- hashtag-til 3y ago
  You mean advantage for who? That their quarrel, not a trend.
  - rwmj 3y ago
    If ARM are going to attack Qualcomm, who else will they go for? Particularly since they now need to justify their very high stock price. With RISC-V you have a clear license (BSD) which lets you do what you want, now and in the future.
    - klelatti 3y ago
      Qualcomm took the first step in this case by trying to sell Nuvia derived designs under their own license agreement. Whoever wins it’s not really Arm going on the ‘attack’ if there is a reasonable case that the license has been breached.
      - TradingPlaces 3y ago
        We have no visibility into either contract at the center of this case. I’m holding off judgement until we understand Qualcomm’s architecture license, and the assignment clause in Nuvia's. I will only say that suing a 10% customer is, generally speaking, a terrible idea.
        klelatti 3y ago
        > a terrible idea Well you’re not really holding off judgment then! It’s also a terrible idea to let big customers breach their contracts but as you say we haven’t seen the contracts concerned.
phkahler 3y ago
>> There are plenty of ISAs you can find freely available today (Open sparc anyone?). The problem is fragmentation… If by "fragmentation" you mean lack of industry-wide support, then you've answered your own question as to why RISC-V. Most Debian packages can run on it. There is even an Android port to RISC-V. Outside x86 and ARM, the next best supported ISA is RISC-V. Unrelated: why do they call the instruction set an architecture or ISA?
- acdha 3y ago
  Strictly speaking an instruction set doesn’t include things like the memory model which you need to know to be able to port code. For example, Apple had to add an extension to their ARM chips which makes stronger guarantees about the order in which memory is written because x86 Mac apps might have dependencies on that which their developers hadn’t been aware of.
  - snvzz 3y ago
    >Strictly speaking an instruction set doesn’t include things like the memory model which you need to know to be able to port code. Very strictly speaking, to the point where it's true but irrelevant. RISC-V does have specifications for memory models: RVWMO and Ztso. They are both ratified.
    - acdha 3y ago
      Oh, apologies if it sounded like I was trying to say RISC-V doesn't - I was only trying to explain why we use the term “instruction set architecture” as opposed to just “instruction set”.
      - snvzz 3y ago
        Because the parent was talking about fragmentation, it does not hurt to ensure it is understood that the memory model _is_ standardized in RISC-V.
- brucehoult 3y ago
dkjaudyeqooe 3y ago
ARM is no saint either. The problem is that when you have total control over the key IP at some point you become prone to extracting more money out of your customers through various forms of coercion. The advantage of moving to RISC-V is that no one owns it and you can always leave your IP vendor for another one. Because RISC-V is an attractive ISA it's having an anti-fragmentation effect, creating a popular standard and an industry around it.

MuffinFlavored 3y ago

aren’t all instruction sets slightly different ways of achieving the same thing at a low level? 8, 16, 32, 64 bit mov + add + sub + load + store. and/or/not/xor, blah blah blah obviously it gets way more complex. just curious “unlocking its potential” i thought the primary benefit of risc-v is how easy it is to implement since it never gets into the more complex messiness that’s modern x86_64 and all of its extensions

rwmj 3y ago
For whatever reason we've decided to allow companies to copyright and patent instruction sets, which means in practice it's completely forbidden to make your own x86-compatible processor, and for ARM you'd better negotiate a license fee up front. RISC-V is permissionless, you just grab the specs and start implementing (or more likely, grab a free core off Github and start modifying it). So that's the difference here. For extensions, RISC-V supports those in a somewhat more structured way. There's both an open process for ratifying standard extensions, and a reserved space for your own custom extensions.
- RetroTechie 3y ago
  Patents covering the earliest x86 cpus have long expired. Copyrights cover documentation, and may cover the names of instructions. But creating something that's interoperable with x86, and doesn't violate those copyrights, should be considered fair use. In the same line of copyrighted APIs vs. competing implementations of said APIs. Basically: make cpu that eats binary code of >20y old x86 cpu, use new names for instructions, and write your own documentation. But of course recent, high performance x86 cpus are still covered by many patents. So what's legal are competing implementations of x86 cpus released ~20y ago, not using performance enhancing technology covered by still-valid patents. To do what? No market for those. Not to mention Intel & AMD have legal teams that could make the going tough for anyone trying to do so. Even if legally allowed. A big advantage for RISC-V is being a clean slate ISA, meaning its design takes into account many issues that were bolted on ad-hoc in other ISAs (32/64 bit, extensions, virtualization, compact instructions, etc). And being a modular design, you don't pay the power/area cost if you just need a simple core.

kwanbix 3y ago

What is crazy is how Apple was able to steal the thunder from all, intel, amd, qualcomm, etc. I really wish the PC (non-apple) world steps up, because I don't like macOS at all, and I don't like to pay the Apple prices either.

neolefty 3y ago
It is so crazy how good they are. I love my Apple hardware (M1 Max, four external displays FTW) and tolerate my Apple software (Mac OS).
- dartos 3y ago
  This. Apple just makes the physically best laptops
  - kwanbix 3y ago
    Cannot disagree more. ThinkPads are the best laptops (not counting the M1/M2 CPU).
    - dartos 3y ago
      I had a Lenovo think pad in 2013 for school. Carried it all over campus for 1 year. So unless their build quality is entirely different nowadays, I’ll never go near another thinkpad It started literally falling apart in 6 months. One of the usb ports stopped working, the disc tray was stuck, the bottom left of the trackpad was sunken in, and the whole laptop felt cheap and was plastic. A ton of flex in the whole thing. The worst experience I had with an aluminum mac was dropping it while open and having the screen shatter.
      - conkeisterdoor 3y ago
        I've had a ThinkPad 13 2G for about 6 years and it's still working fine, but it most likely didn't get the same level of use/wear that yours did. It's a shame that IBM sold its PC business to Lenovo. Maybe it's just the model I have, but Lenovo's ThinkPads feel so much worse in quality than IBM's ThinkPads. I probably won't get another one when the time comes to replace mine.

klelatti 3y ago

> For a product developer, it eliminates the issue of being tied to the limited portfolio of cores available from a proprietary ISA. Hmmm this is the same Qualcomm that had an Arm architecture license for years and ended up using off the shelf Arm cores?

chalst 3y ago
It still has an Arm license, but the outcome of the lawsuit against Qualcomm last year was that Qualcomm could not use the Nuvia design, which used Arm technology, on the idea that Qualcomm did not get the same rights as Nuvia had to use Arm’s designs from their takeover of Nuvia.
- wyldfire 3y ago
  I'm pretty sure you're mistaken and those were only ARM's claims in their suit filed last year. The trial was set to begin on the 23rd. Not sure what the date is now. But you can see depositions being taken in August [1]. [1] https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/64938776/arm-ltd-v-qualcomm-inc/ https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/64938776/arm-ltd-v-qual...
- klelatti 3y ago
  > on the idea that Qualcomm did not get the same rights as Nuvia had to use Arm’s designs The point being that they wanted the rights Nuvia had but without the obligations that Nuvia license implies - most specifically on fees. And yes they have an architecture license but no the lawsuit is still open.
wyldfire 3y ago
... and is now (again) an architectural licensee.

chalst 3y ago

This is a direct consequence of the lawsuit by Arm that prevented Qualcomm from using the Nuvia design in its hardware.

ilyt 3y ago

> We’re investing in RISC-V: Here’s why Coz we don't want to pay for licensing > and what’s in it for you The fun of porting and/or testing everything! Aren't you happy ? Oh, and we will not upstream our drivers as usual so your devices will be landfill after 4 years as usual

wyldfire 3y ago
> Oh, and we will not upstream our drivers as usual so your devices will be landfill after 4 years as usual This is not genuine argument. Check the sources at kernel.org and you will see tons of Qualcomm drivers upstreamed by Qualcomm. Did Qualcomm do a bad job w upstreaming, for years? yes, they did. Are they improving? yes, IMO they are. disclaimer: Qualcomm employee.
- fooker 3y ago
  You start by saying it isn’t a genuine argument and then admit Qualcomm has been bad at this for a while..
  - wyldfire 3y ago
    "we will not" would suggest that any drivers that are present are reverse engineered which is not the case. "Linux 6.2 Expands Support For More Qualcomm Snapdragon SoCs, Apple M1 Pro/Ultra/Max" https://www.phoronix.com/news/Linux-6.2-Arm-SoC-Updates https://www.phoronix.com/news/Linux-6.2-Arm-SoC-Updates "Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 Patches Already Surfacing For The Linux Kernel" https://www.phoronix.com/news/Snapdragon-8-Gen-2-Linux https://www.phoronix.com/news/Snapdragon-8-Gen-2-Linux "Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 Sees Timely Support With The Mainline Linux 5.17 Kernel" https://www.phoronix.com/news/Linux-5.17-Arm https://www.phoronix.com/news/Linux-5.17-Arm
    - AnthonyMouse 3y ago
      Wait, so can you actually install a Linux distribution or stock Android with a mainline kernel on any of these devices?

themiddleupper 3y ago

I believe most of the value in the ISA being open source would be captured by hyperscalars and companies like Qualcomm. With companies like Qualcomm involved, I am afraid they are going to do the whole embrace, extend and extinguish strategy.