4 ms·

> I do personally feel that the #1 application of FPGAs is to make short run and high-end hardware fantastically more expensive for business and government (+mi

> I do personally feel that the #1 application of FPGAs is to make short run and high-end hardware fantastically more expensive for business and government (+military) customers. Not sure I understand. Take for example applications in communications where you need a real time signal processing. The alternatives (custom ASICs) are several orders more expensive. I would actually say the opposite, FPGAs make short-run, high-end affordable to others that are not government or large coperations.

gimmeThaBeet 3y ago
I kind of empathize where they are coming from, my electronics version of "this meeting could have been an email" is "this fpga could have been an arduino". I feel like we're constantly spoiled by the clock speed of computers, they are good enough for so many things. FPGAs can make simple things a bear to implement, and you will just get there faster. But there's a bunch of things where FPGAs are like discovering fire, all the discrete digital logic you ever wanted in the palm of your hand (until you have to meet timing).
- dfox 3y ago
  Apart from my overengineered audio stuff (which is intentionally overengineered, as it is mostly an hobby project/research vehicle) I'm guilty of designing what was essentially an simple scintillation detector around fast ADC, somewhat beefy FPGA and bunch of synchronous SRAM, the final shipped hardware had MSP430, bunch of discrete 74ACT logic and bunch of discrete analog comparators instead of the ~100MSps ADC… You should always do the simplest thing that could possibly work…
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- gorkish 3y ago
  > "this fpga could have been an arduino" That's giving a lot of credit! I see way more of "this FPGA could have been two logic chips and an EEPROM"
gorkish 3y ago
The FPGA in my scope probe that is dutifully implementing the functionality of an EEPROM while loading its configuration from an even larger EEPROM exists in a state of extreme disagreement to your comment. Yeah obviously FPGA's are unquestionably awesome devices, but IMO the real problem with them is they have no long tail or economies of scale compared to other device types. Having worked with them personally, I mostly believe this is because there aren't really any great cross vendor standards analogous to a CPU's ISA. The lack of interoperability absolutely destroys the ability of competition to benefit customers. I'd like to be able to buy a modern $5 part with capabilities equivalent to something like a Cyclone IV, but there's nothing even remotely close.
- ShadowBlades512 3y ago
  For a slowly increasing number of use cases, Lattice is starting to change that. Not quite Cyclone IV, but the ECP5 can be pretty decent for the price. Over time I think their new CertusPro-NX line is going to become interesting.
  - gorkish 3y ago
    That is good! I am hopeful as well! However I don't think that the parts that you are talking about are fundamentally solving the problems I discussed. You have always been able to go to a vendor outside of the top few and get cheaper parts -- for the small price of having to rework basically everything. Something has to break the vendor lock-in a little more completely before this can fundamentally change.

gimmeThaBeet 3y ago

I kind of empathize where they are coming from, my electronics version of "this meeting could have been an email" is "this fpga could have been an arduino". I feel like we're constantly spoiled by the clock speed of computers, they are good enough for so many things. FPGAs can make simple things a bear to implement, and you will just get there faster. But there's a bunch of things where FPGAs are like discovering fire, all the discrete digital logic you ever wanted in the palm of your hand (until you have to meet timing).

dfox 3y ago
Apart from my overengineered audio stuff (which is intentionally overengineered, as it is mostly an hobby project/research vehicle) I'm guilty of designing what was essentially an simple scintillation detector around fast ADC, somewhat beefy FPGA and bunch of synchronous SRAM, the final shipped hardware had MSP430, bunch of discrete 74ACT logic and bunch of discrete analog comparators instead of the ~100MSps ADC… You should always do the simplest thing that could possibly work…
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
gorkish 3y ago
> "this fpga could have been an arduino" That's giving a lot of credit! I see way more of "this FPGA could have been two logic chips and an EEPROM"

gorkish 3y ago

The FPGA in my scope probe that is dutifully implementing the functionality of an EEPROM while loading its configuration from an even larger EEPROM exists in a state of extreme disagreement to your comment. Yeah obviously FPGA's are unquestionably awesome devices, but IMO the real problem with them is they have no long tail or economies of scale compared to other device types. Having worked with them personally, I mostly believe this is because there aren't really any great cross vendor standards analogous to a CPU's ISA. The lack of interoperability absolutely destroys the ability of competition to benefit customers. I'd like to be able to buy a modern $5 part with capabilities equivalent to something like a Cyclone IV, but there's nothing even remotely close.

ShadowBlades512 3y ago
For a slowly increasing number of use cases, Lattice is starting to change that. Not quite Cyclone IV, but the ECP5 can be pretty decent for the price. Over time I think their new CertusPro-NX line is going to become interesting.
- gorkish 3y ago
  That is good! I am hopeful as well! However I don't think that the parts that you are talking about are fundamentally solving the problems I discussed. You have always been able to go to a vendor outside of the top few and get cheaper parts -- for the small price of having to rework basically everything. Something has to break the vendor lock-in a little more completely before this can fundamentally change.