Articles – Page 521

Does Harry Use Tools?

August 5, 2008

In England there is a phrase used to describe a significant sub-class of embedded engineers – “Fred in a shed.” It is the guy who works for himself and carries out contract work for a range of different people. I prefer to think of him as a sub-set of “Harry the Hairy Hacker.” You must all know him – even when he is in part of a multi-national company and not in a shed. He has war stories of how he single-handedly saved a project by coding in machine code for 48 hours without a break, and then, … Read More → "Does Harry Use Tools?"

The Big eASY

eASIC Debuts 45nm FPGA Killer

by Kevin Morris

August 5, 2008

What’s bigger, faster, cheaper, and lower-power than the biggest, newest 65nm and 40nm FPGAs?

ASICs, of course.

OK, I can hear you already –

“That’s not a fair comparison.”

“You need a team of 50 experts to design a high-end ASIC.”

“By the time you factor in NRE and mask costs, ASIC costs a lot more unless your volume is in the millions.”

“ASIC has very long design cycles.”

“ … Read More → "The Big eASY"

ESL Gets a New Taker

Cadence Announces C-to-Silicon

by Bryon Moyer

July 29, 2008

Electronic system level (ESL) design has struggled to convince doubters that it’s more than a marketing TLA. But the most visibly productive ESL tools in recent years have been those that synthesize C into lower-level RTL. Doing logic synthesis from C has been a long-time vision for raising the level of abstraction of design. But the history of the technology, which predates the ESL phenom, is checkered and has left a sour taste in many designers’ mouths. Each new offering has had to convince rather dubious prospects that they were different from what had … Read More → "ESL Gets a New Taker"

Let’s Abolish All Patents

by Dick Selwood

July 29, 2008

“The first thing we do, let’s kill all the (patent) lawyers.” – William Shakespeare: Henry the Sixth, Part 2, Act IV, Scene II (sort of)

Where would our industry be without patents? Indeed, what kind of world would we live in if there were no patents or patent rights?

It would be a better place, that’s what.

It’s an idea worth exploring, if for no other reason than to inject some much-needed sanity into the current climate … Read More → "Let’s Abolish All Patents"

Complexitango

Chaos of Our Own Making

by Kevin Morris

July 29, 2008

For years now, FPGA companies have been proclaiming that you can use their devices to create a “System on a Chip.” We’ve seen “SoCs,” “Programmable System-on-Chip.” “SoPC,” “Platform FPGA,” and numerous other marketing-oriented, pseudo-jargonic phraseologies.

Supposing that’s true, and we want to put a “system” onto a chip. What exactly is a “system”?

Wikipedia tells us a “system” is a “set of interacting or interdependent entities, real or abstract, forming an integrated … Read More → "Complexitango"

Complexitango

Chaos of Our Own Making

by Kevin Morris

July 29, 2008

Supposing that’s true, and we want to put a “system” onto a chip. What exactly is a “system”?

Wikipedia tells us a “system” is a “set of interacting or interdependent entities, real or abstract, forming an integrated whole.” An “embedded system” is widely accepted as a computer that is integrated or embedded into some other device. For our purposes today, though, I’d like to go with the definition offered by a former colleague of mine:

“A ‘ … Read More → "Complexitango"

A Non-Volatile Middle Ground

Few-Times-Programmable Memory from Virage and… um… Virage

by Bryon Moyer

July 22, 2008

A few weeks ago we started a look at Logic Non-Volatile Memory (Logic NVM) options. These are non-volatile memories intended for embedding in SoCs using only standard logic processes instead of the more complicated processes designed to optimize large quantities of memory. We looked at one-time programmable (OTP) versions, which, not too surprisingly, can be programmed only once. We also looked at multiple-time programmable (MTP) versions, which can in general be programmed 100,000+ times while maintaining a data retention time of 10 years or more even on the 100,000th programming.

But there’s another … Read More → "A Non-Volatile Middle Ground"

Citius, Altius, Fortius

XAP5 Goes for Gold

by Jim Turley

July 22, 2008

Better, stronger, faster. Isn’t that what every new microprocessor is supposed to deliver? Hope springs eternal in the breast of many a processor-marketing drone. Their new chip isn’t just better than the previous one, it’s better than everyone else’s, too.

And you know, sometimes that promise actually comes true. A case in point is the XAP5 processor from Cambridge Consultants, a company of consultants located in – wait for it – Cambridge, England. Actually, they’re located in Cambridge, Massachusetts as well, a choice … Read More → "Citius, Altius, Fortius"

How Many Nanometers Do I Need?

Unraveling the Node Wars

by Kevin Morris

July 22, 2008

Many of us toss the process node into casual conversation, pretending we know what it actually means… “I hear that SilBlaster is already working on a 37nm FPGA based on TSMC’s medium-K, oxide-minimized, semi-strained, anti-dielectric half-pitch.” (If you get enough things that sound like buzzwords in there, most people will be too frightened to challenge you.)

In reality, though, most of us designing products with programmable logic are pretty well insulated from the vagaries of semiconductor processes. When I got my first car that had four valves per cylinder, … Read More → "How Many Nanometers Do I Need?"

Yet Another Twist on Making Software Faster

CriticalBlue Creates Custom Coprocessors

by Bryon Moyer

July 15, 2008

We seem to have this love/hate relationship with software. We like it because it’s so durn flexible and we can implement changes quickly. Well, unless we really hose things up. But you have to be a real goober to need a change that takes longer than a hardware change*. I mean a real hardware change, like a silicon spin.

But there’s a problem with software: it’s slow. Since the dawn of time, man has labored to find ways to make software go faster. OK, so maybe more like the dawn … Read More → "Yet Another Twist on Making Software Faster"