Articles – Page 5

Designing MPU/MCU/SoC/AI Hardware? Are You Sure Your Security Features Are Secure?

January 25, 2024

I’ve said it before, and I’ll doubtless say it again (actually, now I come to think about it, I’ve said “I’ve said it before, and I’ll doubtless say it again” before, and I’ll doubtless say it again; whatever you do, don’t get me rambling about recursion), I cannot help but don my frowny face when I think about those nefarious cyber-scoundrels who make the world a worse place for everyone. I have naught but loathing for the creators of malware, ransomware, and any other “ware” of this ilk.

Generative AI Is Coming to the Edge!

by Max Maxfield

January 23, 2024

Over the past few months, I’ve waffled on (as is my wont) about various flavors (ooh, tasty) of generative artificial intelligence (GenAI). On the menu were items like GitHub Copilot, which generates code (throwing in errors and security vulnerabilities for free), and Metabob from Metabob (can you spell “Zen”), which looks at the code generated by GitHub Copilot and takes the bugs and security vulnerabilities out again (to understand recursion, you must first understand recursion).

We’ve also discussed other GenAI-based Copilots, like Read More → "Generative AI Is Coming to the Edge!"

Would you buy a $20 GateMate FPGA from Germany’s Cologne Chip?

by Steven Leibson

January 22, 2024

My good friend Adam Taylor recently published a couple of blogs about a new-to-me FPGA vendor named Cologne Chip, a 25-year veteran semiconductor vendor. The company was founded in 1994 as Cologne Chip Designs, and back then, it focused on developing ASICs for the nascent ISDN market. ISDN, or the Integrated Services Digital Network, was the telecom industry’s early effort to develop a digital standard interconnect for telephone systems. Within two years, Cologne Chip Designs had introduced its first ISDN chip. (ISDN standardization took so long that the four-letter abbreviation came to be reinterpreted as “I still … Read More → "Would you buy a $20 GateMate FPGA from Germany’s Cologne Chip?"

We Already Have Cars That Can See, How About Cars That Can Hear?

by Max Maxfield

January 18, 2024

As I’ve mentioned before (and as I will doubtless remark on again), if we were to inquire as to how many senses humans have, most people’s knee-jerk reaction would be to say “Five” and to recite those senses we were all taught at school: Sight, Sound, Smell, Taste, and Touch. In reality, as I wrote in a blog about the possibilities of alien life, we all have as many as 20 senses, or more. … Read More →

Adventures with SiTime’s MEMS-based Super-TXCOs – Super Accurate Clocks for the Future – Part 1

by Steven Leibson

January 17, 2024

Clocks are integral to most electronic systems. Timing and communications systems need extremely accurate clocks. When I started working with electronics, in the heyday of Citizen’s Band (CB) radio, quartz crystals were on sale everywhere, even at Radio Shack. The CB crystals congregated around 27 and 28 MHz, but many more frequencies were on offer. As I started designing circuits as an engineer, I used many specific crystal frequencies: 32.768 kHz for real-time clock circuits, 3.57954 MHz for the TV color burst, 1.8432 MHz for the Motorola MC14411 bit-rate generator, 4.9152 MHz for the bit-rate generator in the Signetics 2661 enhanced communications chip, … Read More → "Adventures with SiTime’s MEMS-based Super-TXCOs – Super Accurate Clocks for the Future – Part 1"

Addressing The Memory Guy’s CXL Conundrums

by Steven Leibson

January 15, 2024

My friend Jim Handy (The Memory Guy) recently published a blog about Compute Express Link (CXL) and two conundrums he perceives about the technology. CXL is a relatively new cache-coherent memory protocol based on open standards that’s designed to make large memory pools available to multiple processors in large computer systems and data centers. CXL’s central objective, in my opinion, is to help data center architects avoid overprovisioning every CPU in a multiprocessor … Read More → "Addressing The Memory Guy’s CXL Conundrums"

Is MIPS Poised to Take the RISC-V World by Storm?

by Max Maxfield

January 11, 2024

Sometimes the world can be a funny old place. Take computer companies, for example. Some (like IBM) seem to have been around forever and they also seem destined to stay around forever. Others flicker in and out of existence so quickly that most folks are never even aware they existed in the first place. Still others pop up and down as if they were engaged in a deranged game of corporate Whac-A-Mole. … Read More →

Within Five Years, All New Cars Will Be Able to See at Night!

by Max Maxfield

January 9, 2024

A few evenings ago as I pen these words, my wife (Gina the Gorgeous), your humble narrator (I pride myself on my humility), and a number of other people were visiting at a friend’s house. There were about 20 of us. Only non-alcoholic drinks were consumed. It was dark when we all decided to head for home. Some were walking. I was driving. At least one of the people on foot almost failed to complete their journey.

Some of the folks set off perambulating down the road while the rest of us milled … Read More → "Within Five Years, All New Cars Will Be Able to See at Night!"

The Case of One Dead Digital Multimeter

by Steven Leibson

January 8, 2024

There’s no more fundamental piece of test gear for electrical engineers than a multimeter. I own a bunch, starting with my Micronta 22-150 analog multimeter with a mirrored scale, which I bought from Radio Shack in my high school days back in the 1970s. Miraculously, that meter still works. I’ve got at least five Cen-Tech 3½-digit Digital Multimeters that Harbor Freight used to give away for free with a coupon. (That’s about what they’re worth.) These meters are slow and have relatively low resolution, but they’re fine for monitoring multiple power supply … Read More → "The Case of One Dead Digital Multimeter"

Photo-Realistic Renderings for Next-Gen Engineering Applications

by Max Maxfield

January 4, 2024

I was just introduced to the HOOPS Luminate SDK from the folks at Tech Soft 3D, which caused a cascade of cogitations to commence careening around my poor old noggin…

I’m not a big player of computer games, if the truth be told, but I do … Read More → "Photo-Realistic Renderings for Next-Gen Engineering Applications"