The first RISC-V portable computer is now available

https://lunduke.substack.com/p/the-first-risc-v-portable-computer

by josteink • 4 years ago

369 176 4 years ago

lunduke.substack.com

humanwhosits• 4 years ago

Who built the cpu itself? It's interesting that it claims V-extension support, even though that was only just ratified

mhh__5• 4 years ago

The vector extension was implemented in industry based on the draft rather than waiting until ratification AFAIK

snvzz16• 4 years ago

The vector extension was implemented in industry based on the draft

Not widely if that's what you meant by "in industry".

Most (like SiFive) did indeed wait for ratification (in case of last minute changes), before announcing their cores.

Pre-standard V chips do of course exist, and this is a good thing (there's better testing in using actual hardware implementations).

They have to use the opcode space reserved for custom extensions, and obviously cannot claim V compatibility. No overlap with actual V opcode space, and therefore no compatibility issues.

These are, nevertheless, fine for embedded uses in which the vendor has control over the whole stack.

It does also mean they have to take on the associated cost of having to maintain it, unless they choose not to actually use the custom extension at all, a choice that realistically will actually suffice for most deployments.

mhh__5• 4 years ago

Allwinner, the core is a XuanTie C906 I think.

Beltalowda3• 4 years ago

Allwinner D1: https://linux-sunxi.org/D1 - SoC based on XuanTie C906.

submeta• 4 years ago

Does it run Emacs? :)

kragen19• 4 years ago

Evidently it runs LibreOffice and Vim, so I can't imagine Emacs would be any problem: https://artvsentropy.wordpress.com/2022/01/15/writing-on-the...

nathanasmith• 4 years ago

It appears that device isn't using the RISC-V module under discussion but an ARM version instead.

I decided to install in my DevTerm the simplest module compatible with the popular RaspberryPi Linux distribution. It’s slower than the other “cores” but less power-hungry, and it’s very simple to install pre-compiled software and look up answers for any questions (as the RaspberryPi community is so huge). Yet this core still gives the user an ARM64-bit Quad-Core Cortex-A53 1.2 GHz CPU and 1 GB of RAM — more than enough to run simple writing apps.

cultofmetatron• 4 years ago

looks awesome as a toy but a bit impractical for traveling with. Would be an instant buy when its available in a pinebook pro form factor.

jjice• 4 years ago

"Awesome toy" is a good way to put it. Very neat, but not practical for me. Really excited to see some RISC-V stuff though.

Beltalowda3• 4 years ago

Looking at some videos, overall my impression is that it's too large to be very portable, but too small to be truly usable. The device sits in a bit of a size "dead zone" where it has the worst aspects of all form factors.

Cthulhu_2• 4 years ago

But on a positive spin, maybe that's exactly what you need to come up with some unique use cases.

mhh__5• 4 years ago

$239 is a lot of money for a meme. The processor looks just as closed as a raspberry pi

pelasaco• 4 years ago

$239 + 60 business days

rjsw• 4 years ago

The processor avoids being closed by not having a GPU.

mhh__5• 4 years ago

So where's the RTL for the processor then?

WillFlux• 4 years ago

The keyboard seems to be the weakness of the DevTerm, which is a shame. This review was typical:

"The keyboard is just OK. To be honest, it was the only part of the device I was a bit disappointed about. The keys are small, not spaced apart enough, and can be hard to press." [1]

[1] https://artvsentropy.wordpress.com/2022/01/15/writing-on-the...

ad8e• 4 years ago

The key positions are also different from a normal keyboard: all rows are shifted by 1/4, whereas a QWERTY keyboard has 1/2 shifts between rows 1-Q and A-Z, and 1/4 between Q-A.

From a psychological UX perspective, I'd prefer 1/2 shifts between all the rows, creating a hex grid.

Ortho is also logical and justifiable, although its packing is worse than hex.

But if convention is to be broken, it should not be the 1/4 that this product has chosen, which offers no benefit and creates an unfamiliarity cost. Better to stick with the standard key positions than this.

willcipriano3• 4 years ago

Trackpad isn't fantastic either, it's unusable out of the box but the community made a patch that makes it mostly ok.

GekkePrutser2• 4 years ago

Haha just like the pinebook pro.

I've actually got an atom based PC that uses the exact same chassis and trackpad as the pinebook pro, and I've been trying to use the same community firmware. Because it is indeed horrible by default. Random touches, scrolling instead of pointing etc. No palm rekection at all.

Unfortunately I never managed to get it to install :(

dogecoinbase• 4 years ago

The module is available on its own, and cheap enough that I picked one up to try in a different rPi compute module host board: https://www.clockworkpi.com/product-page/copy-of-clockworkpi...

Hopefully it works!

sitzkrieg• 4 years ago

awesome was hopin to avoid the keyboard and stuff i dont need so this is perfect

tasty_freeze• 4 years ago

It looks a lot like the TRS-80 Model 100:

https://www.digibarn.com/collections/systems/trs80-model100/

cduzz• 4 years ago

Unfortunately, although it looks like a TRS-80 100/102, or a wp2, it is actually enough smaller that it looks like you wouldn't be able to type on it.

I'd buy something like this if it were the size of a normal keyboard (and as long as it cost less than 300, oh, and as long as it has 4gb of ram. yeah, probably I'm not actually the target market).

jgtrosh• 4 years ago

I've used my DevTerm for a while, and the keyboard is definitely small. You get better using it after some time, but the key size and the unorthodox key placement due to size constraints does make it more of a toy than an actual “dev term”. That's fine for me since I didn't have any serious use planned for it: I'm currently using it as a text game terminal with TTY duplication on the thermal printer. That's pretty fun to hand out to friends to introduce them to some retro computing, but I wouldn't advocate the device as a serious computing platform.

hnthrowaway0315• 4 years ago

Now to see if I can convince my wife to let me buy one.

Exactly what I'm thinking.

civilized• 4 years ago

The design looks like it's from the 80s or earlier. Is this some sort of nostalgia thing?

Elidrake42• 4 years ago

The article links to the inspiration in the second paragraph: https://lunduke.substack.com/p/the-last-programming-project-...

kragen19• 4 years ago

This seems like an inspiring step in the direction of a device that I want, but which as far as I can tell, doesn't exist, but I have one burning question:

How small is it?

I've been trying to figure out what I need for comfortable portable writing. I have an Aspire One that's pretty much at the lower limit for key spacing for my hands, with 17 mm × 16 mm keys. I'm typing this on a cheap USB external keyboard with keys closer to 18.5 mm wide, and I think slightly tighter spacing would be more comfortable. I might be able to make do with 15 mm or even 14 mm horizontal key spacing, but my fingers would collide. Someone with smaller hands could manage a slightly smaller keyboard, but not that much smaller. Touchtyping becomes impossible and you're reduced to typing with two fingers like a five-year-old.

Unfortunately none of https://artvsentropy.wordpress.com/2022/01/15/writing-on-the... https://lunduke.substack.com/p/the-first-risc-v-portable-com... https://www.clockworkpi.com/product-page/devterm-kit-r01 bothers to give any dimensions at all, even when they spend a lot of time talking about how small it is.

From my point of view, this is more important than the information they did give, and it seems like it was pretty important to them too, so I don't understand why they omitted this information.

What I want is:

1. A computer powerful enough to recompile all its own software,

2. which can run a reasonably convenient programming environment (my bar is pretty low here: at least as good as Emacs with GCC on a VAX with a VT100, or MPW on a Macintosh SE),

3. which fits in my pocket,

4. which doesn't need batteries or plugging in,

5. which I can recover if I corrupt its filesystem, and

6. which is usable in direct sunlight.

This laptop fulfills points #1, #2, and #5. My cellphone fulfills points #2, #3, and #6. My solar calculator fulfills points #3, #4, #5 (trivially), and #6. It looks like this "DevTerm" fulfills points #1, #2, and #5, same as my current laptop but maybe slightly more portable. But I don't think any computing device exists, or ever has existed, that hits all of these points. But I think it's attainable now.

I think the conjunction of points #2 and #3 probably requires the thing to unfold or deploy somehow, unless some kind of Twiddler-like device would allow me to do it one-handed. There just isn't room for both of my hands at once on the surface of things that fit in my pocket (about 100 mm × 120 mm). Conceivably a laser projection keyboard could work.

unwind• 4 years ago

* which doesn't need batteries or plugging in *

So, uh, it has to be solar powered only? That sounds fantastically niche and not like something someone would want to design/build.

I think any reasonable "work" performance level would require too large an area of solar cells in order to be practical, especially if it should work indoors.

kragen19• 4 years ago

Solar power does seem like the most reasonable option, although other possibilities include energy harvesting from keyboard interaction, piezoelectric shoe soles like those that drive those LED-flashing shoes, or a pullstring. You need some energy storage, but at low power levels a modern ceramic capacitor is more than adequate in between pullstring pulls or whatever. Many of my earlier notes on the topic are in https://dercuano.github.io/notes/keyboard-powered-computers.... and https://dercuano.github.io/topics/energy-harvesting.html; more recent ones are in http://canonical.org/~kragen/derctuo and http://canonical.org/~kragen/dernocua.

But last year I learned about two innovations that have been brought to market that dramatically increase the potential abilities of such a device.

— ⁂ —

It's entirely possible that your definition of 'any reasonable "work" performance level' is orders of magnitude higher than my "reasonably convenient programming environment". The VAX reference point is 1 Dhrystone MIPS, and the Macintosh SE (a 7.8 MHz 68000) was also about 1 Dhrystone MIPS. Current ARM7 Cortex designs deliver about 2 Dhrystone MIPS per MHz, so we're talking about 500kHz of ARM7 instructions here.

Without any fancy circuitry at all I was able to squeeze 8 mW out of a 38-mm-square solar panel from a dollar-store garden light, in direct sunlight. Theory predicts it should be capable of 200+ mW (16% efficiency, 1000 W/m²) so hopefully I can get better results out of other panels. The amorphous solar panels normally used on solar calculators, which work well indoors as well as in direct sunlight, are nominally about 10% efficient, which is to say, 10 mW/cm² in direct sunlight or 100 μW/cm² in office lighting. It's easy to imagine dedicating 30 cm² of surface area to solar panels, which would give you 300 mW outdoors or 3 mW indoors. (38 mm square is 14 cm². 30 cm² in medieval units is about 4⅝ square inches, depending on which inch you use.)

— ⁂ —

So, what kind of computer can you run on a milliwatt or so?

Ambiq sells an ultra-low-power Cortex-M4F called Apollo3 Blue with 1MiB Flash plus 384 KiB RAM; the datasheet claims that, when fully active, at 3.3 volts, it uses 68 μA plus 10 μA per MHz running application code, and it runs at up to 48 MHz bursting to 96 MHz. So at, say, 10 MHz (20 VAXen or Macintosh SEs), it should use 170 μA or 550 μW. At 48 MHz (100 VAXen or Mac SEs), 550 μA or 1.8 mW. I haven't tested it yet. SparkFun sells a devboard for US$22 at https://www.sparkfun.com/products/15444.

Remembering, of course, that benchmarks are always pretty bogus, we can still roughly approximate this 20 DMIPS performance level as being roughly the processing speed of a 386/40, 486/25, or SPARC 2, and the 200 DMIPS peak as being roughly the processing speed of a Pentium Pro, PowerMac 7100, or SPARC 20 — but with enormously less RAM, an enormously lower-latency "disk", and a lower bandwidth budget for the disk. And no MMU, so no fork() and no demand-paged executables. You do get memory protection, hardware floating point, and saturating arithmetic, but no MMX-like SIMD instructions.

— ⁂ —

If the computer's output isn't going to be just an earphone or something, though, you may need to spend substantial energy on a screen as well. Sharp makes a 400×240 "memory LCD" display (0.1 megapixels) used in, for example, Panic's Playdate handheld game console (https://youtu.be/uziFTK5c29k) which seems like it should enable submilliwatt personal computing; the datasheet says it uses 175 μW when being constantly updated with a worst-case update pattern at its maximum of 20 Hz. Adafruit sells a breakout board for the display for US$45: https://www.adafruit.com/product/4694

A VT100's character cell was 8×10 (https://sudonull.com/post/30508-Recreating-CRT-Fonts), so its 80×25 screen was 640×250, 0.16 megapixels, while the Macintosh SE was 512×342, 0.18 megapixels. Both of them were 1 bit deep: a pixel was either on or off. So two of these LCD screens together gives you more pixels than either of these two reference-point computers. However, the pixels are physically a lot smaller, which may compromise readability. (On the other hand, as you can see from the Playdate videos, you can do a lot of things on this display that a VT100 or Mac SE could never dream of doing because of lack of compute and RAM.)

— ⁂ —

So, I think it's eminently feasible now, although it probably wasn't feasible ten years ago. But it's going to be a challenge; I can't just compile Linux and fire up Vim. Even if Linux could run on these super-low-power computers, they don't have enough memory to recompile it.

phil2942• 4 years ago

I really don't understand everyone's obsession with mobile computing power. Why aren't we equipping our our laptops with low energy processors and use them to remotely access more powerful stationary work stations via networking? Instead of carrying around 4.8 GHz all the time, I'd much rather have multiple days of battery lifetime. We must have taken a wrong step somewhere. I am still convinced processing outsourcing is the future for all things hardware intensive such as gaming, if it is not for some unexpected milestone in battery technology.

Besides,

4. which doesn't need batteries or plugging in

what do you mean by that? Would that include only solar-powered devices?

kragen19• 4 years ago

See https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30691361 for notes on energy sources. I'm open to alternatives to solar.

I agree that making computing power mobile makes it enormously more expensive, especially if you consider batteries unacceptable. But making computing power remote means that you need to spend energy on a radio to access it. That's a good tradeoff for some things, but not for others. In my other comment, note that if we believe Ambiq's datasheet, we can get the CPU speed of a SPARC 20 for 1.8 milliwatts.

It turns out the chip also includes a Bluetooth Low Energy 5 radio, so you can use it to remotely access more powerful stationary workstations via networking, as long as you're within a few meters of a base station. The radio costs 10 milliwatts when you're running it, six times as much as the Pentium-class CPU. Normal radios (Wi-Fi, cellphones) cost orders of magnitude more than that.

So constant remote wireless access to more powerful stationary workstations doesn't start to save energy until the amount of computation you're accessing is close to a gigaflop. Maybe closer to a teraflop if we're talking about streaming full-motion video. Intermittent remote access, of course, is a more reasonable proposition.

It's true that gaming commonly uses teraflops or petaflops of computing power, and plugging in such a beast in a server closet is a huge improvement over trying to somehow cram it into your pocket. But there are a lot of day-to-day things I do with a computer — recompiling my text editor, writing stupid comments on internet message boards, chatting on IRC, simulating an analog circuit, reading Wikipedia — that very much do not require gigaflops of computing power.

(Remote wired access of course can use very little power indeed, but if you're in a position to plug into a wire, you might as well deliver power over that wire too.)

If you take a modern cellphone and take almost all the processing power out of it, you still have a 1000-milliwatt radio and a 1000-milliwatt backlit screen. So you aren't going to get multiple days of battery life that way. 1000 milliwatts is enough to pay for dozens of gigaflops of computing power nowadays.

Myself, I have another reason: I travel, though I've traveled very little during the pandemic. But I am often someplace other than at home: at a café, in a park, at the office, in a bus, in the subway, in a taxi, visiting a friend in another city, at my in-laws' house, and so on. All of these places are out of Bluetooth range of my house. I could obtain internet bandwidth from a commercial provider, but that sacrifices privacy, it's never reliable, and I don't consider it reasonable to make my core exocortical functions dependent on the day-to-day vagaries of mere commerce. Personal autonomy is one of my core values.

chillfox2• 4 years ago

I am still convinced processing outsourcing is the future for all things hardware intensive such as gaming

I really hope not. The closest data center to me is about 70ms on a great day.

Most online games chose to host on servers that are 200-400ms away, it sucks immensely, so I don't play those games.

phendrenad22• 4 years ago

This is certainly dead on arrival, right? Nobody wants or has ever wanted a computer with a screen flush with the keyboard. This was even known in the late 90s: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jornada_(PDA)#Jornada_720

Maybe someone can hack a longer flexible ribbon cable and a hinge? And sell it as an aftermarket kit? Please? (The thing looks pretty cool otherwise).

sp332• 4 years ago

They've been selling terminals with a similar form factor (and a different internals) for a couple years now.

bitwize• 4 years ago

This is certainly dead on arrival, right? Nobody wants or has ever wanted a computer with a screen flush with the keyboard.

The Tandy 100, whose design inspired this machine, was very popular among journalists as a note taking machine.

kragen19• 4 years ago

Yeah, I saw a reporter typing up a sports story on a TRS-80 Model 100 in a Wendy's in San Mateo in 01996, 13 years after the machine's release. I think it had been discontinued for many years at that point.

They're still around but I haven't seen one since then.

syntheweave• 4 years ago

I'd use it as a macro keypad. There's a mostly unaddressed use case for high-end macro users. You can get remotes with a few buttons, a knob and in some cases a screen capable of a bit of text labels(like Xencelabs Quick Keys). You can hack a dollar store keyboard and label it yourself, but then you have to maintain the software to keep it in sync. You can get the Elgato Stream Deck, which is effective but expensive and pretty one-of-a-kind between the button displays and the software integrations. And you can use some phone apps to get a touchscreen remote. But there are only a few examples of something like this device where you have a bunch of real keys plus a separate screen that can support high res graphics, without going all the way up to laptop form factors(too much screen).

lproven2• 4 years ago

Nobody wants or has ever wanted a computer with a screen flush with the keyboard.

You are badly wrong here.

I see others are pointing to the Tandy Model 100.

I will add the Cambridge Z88: http://www.computinghistory.org.uk/det/4860/Cambridge-Z88/ https://oldcomputers.net/cambridge-z88.html

Still in use, OS still being updated, spares and addons available new. https://www.rwapsoftware.co.uk/z88.html

And the Amstrad NC100: https://www.ncus.org.uk/intro.htm

I have both. I have written about them: https://www.theregister.com/2011/11/10/portable_writing_tool...

I also have both an AlphaSmart 3000 and a Dana Wireless: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AlphaSmart

There was the QuickPad: https://www.techtoolsforwriters.com/tag/quickpad/

... and the DOS-compatible QuickPad Pro: https://www.victor-notes.com/qppro/

And the Fusion Writer: https://www.at-udl.net/Writer-Fusion_2223

And the Tandy Portable Wordprocessor range: http://www.computinghistory.org.uk/det/2720/Tandy-Portable-W...

In terms of contemporary modern kit...

The Freewrite: https://getfreewrite.com/

There's this modern peripheral: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/ficihp/ficihp-multifunc...

And this device: https://www.hackster.io/news/the-ready-computer-model-100-bl...

As you can see this is an area of considerable interest for a lot of people, and I'd like an inexpensive modern one myself. For me, the DevTerm is too small.

phendrenad22• 4 years ago

We can exclude all of the 1980s DOS-based models you linked. In the 80s getting a computer made was a feat unto itself, a tilting LCD monitor would have sent the price to the moon.

So that leaves the last 3 links you provide.

#1: The screen is slightly tilted. So it isn't "flush with the keyboard" as I described. Also, this seems to have a typewriter-quality keyboard, which is the selling point there. I'm sure the users are touch-typists who are writing their novel, not someone trying to use BASH and VIM, which I'll have you note, is the target audience of this RISC-V computer.

#2: ...This is a keyboard. Which you connect to an external monitor. Sure, it has an internal monitor, but you can clearly see from the demo that it's meant for preferences and settings. You don't use it standalone. On-the-go seems to be a feature, but it isn't the focus, so it isn't a good example.

#3: ...This is a toy. This is a nostalgia talisman for people who want to go to a techno rave, or people who like the aesthetic of the Tandy 100. It isn't meant for practical use.

colordrops• 4 years ago

it’s hard to not immediately fall head over heels

No doubt, because you're going to be cricking your neck over to look at the thing. Looks painful.

squarefoot• 4 years ago

Another similar device, although more powerful and more interesting hardware-wise, would be the Pocket Popcorn Computer, which unfortunately still hasn't provided any proof of being a real product other than shiny 3D renders.

https://pocket.popcorncomputer.com/

Edit: I stand corrected, totally missed the blog posts and the videos, happy to see I was wrong; the pandemic has been hard for many businesses unfortunately. If I may, they should put something on the homepage too however, as I recall monitoring it from time to time since probably over two years and it never showed that there were working prototypes. This would help to fuel interest.

floren• 4 years ago

I went to school with Alan and Jose, and I believe they're honestly doing their best to get a real product out there. The company blog (https://blog.popcorncomputer.com/) indicates that they should be shipping to the earliest purchasers very soon.

Beltalowda3• 4 years ago

still hasn't provided any proof of being a real product other than shiny 3D renders

There are pictures and videos of development devices on Twitter; for example: https://twitter.com/gajjar04akash1/status/148444172903842611...

snvzz16• 4 years ago

Quad-Core ARM Cortex-A53 CPU

Wrong ISA to be on topic.

Maursault• 4 years ago

I think this is neat, but it is either too expensive or it is underpowered for the price. I think if you bought a 7th Gen iPod Touch, available since April 2019, and jailbroke it, and added a bluetooth keyboard, you'd have a far more powerful computer (A10 chip has two high performance cores @1.64Ghz plus two more efficiency cores) for about the same price, plus you'd also still have an iPod and mobile Safari.

dijit• 4 years ago

But. It wouldn’t be riscv. Which is the unique selling point. Not the power.

detaro• 4 years ago

First iteration and niche nerd product is obviously going to be more expensive.

Koshkin• 4 years ago

For some reason I hate it when the Fn key is the first key on the left. (What I hate even more is that laptop manufacturers have no agreement on this.)

spullara3• 4 years ago

Why? Do you use the Fn key all the time? I sent my Dell laptop back because the ctrl key was on the left and an unremappable Fn key was where ctrl is supposed to be.

kupfer• 4 years ago

I press Ctrl+Shift+C/V quite often and it's for me it's easier to do with the left hand only when Ctrl is below Shift.

sixothree• 4 years ago

Control key has been bottom left key on most keyboards for 40 years now.

LAC-Tech3• 4 years ago

I'm the exact opposite - I wish more of them put it on the left! Especially with smaller keyboards where you need it to access certain keys.

tuxone• 4 years ago

At least some brands let you switch Fn and Ctrl via bios settings. This help me be consistent with full size external keyboards.

ge964• 4 years ago

Yeah Thinkpad

candyman• 4 years ago

Man that's ugly.

Splendor• 4 years ago

Direct link to the computer in question: https://www.clockworkpi.com/product-page/devterm-kit-r01

willcipriano3• 4 years ago

I've got the A04 model (ARM). Its more of something to play with than anything else. I keep it by my bed for fooling around with my side projects in the night.

sylware• 4 years ago

IMHO, for devs, a modular laptop would be more appropriate: a display panel, a CPU/GPU box, mouse/keyboard, a battery pack... and the bag designed to carry those components.

snek_case• 4 years ago

What could be really cool is a lunchbox portable computer with a keyboard that closes on the front: https://www.flickr.com/photos/befuddledsenses/493303864

I think you could make it pretty small but still large enough to fit two small PCI-express cards and replaceable/upgradeable RAM modules. It would be a good format for tinkerers, very amenable to having replaceable parts and being user-serviceable. Throw some GPIO in there and you would have a real winner for the maker crowd.

EDIT: someone build this lunchbox portable with a raspberry pi and it looks really awesome: https://hackaday.com/2020/06/09/lunchbox-cyberdeck-is-a-tast...

rileyphone• 4 years ago

Check out the Pockit that was on here a few days ago: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b3F9OtH2Xx4&list=UU49EYw900L...

bragr2• 4 years ago

To be among the first to use an open source, RISC-V CPU in a regular computer? A portable one, no less?! To be a pioneer of a more open hardware future? That sounds like an absolute privilege.

Is this an actual open source processor? I can't find any info on it either way. A lot of the conversation around RISC-V seems to conflate the open source nature of the ISA with the the actual implementation. Even the reference implementations are BSD licensed so people are allowed to distribute proprietary derivatives to say nothing of completely proprietary implementations.

If all or most of the implementations are propriety, I feel like it is a mostly lateral move from ARM as, although it is not open source, the ARM ISA is readily available [1], and the same kinds of rarified CPU engineering and academic circles that will have influence in the RISC-V Foundation, already influence ARM.

[1] https://developer.arm.com/architectures/cpu-architecture/a-p...

mnd999• 4 years ago

The BSD license is definitely open source. It’s just not ‘free software’ in the FSF sense.

snvzz16• 4 years ago

BSD license absolutely is "free software" in the FSF sense. The four freedoms are guaranteed by it, and it is even listed explicitly in their list of free software licenses.

openfuture• 4 years ago

BSD is free software in the FSF sense. It isn't copyleft though.

bragr2• 4 years ago

It's not about the license really. It's just that I see no real reason why we should consider all the propriety implementations of RISC-V any materially more open source than any random ARM processor. Either way we know the ISA but little of the internals and can't practically audit or change them.

snvzz16• 4 years ago

Is this an actual open source processor?

AIUI the SoC is not open, but the CPU design it contains, XuanTie C906, is.

It would even be decent if it had standard V extension, but sadly it uses an incompatible pre-standard draft.

phkahler• 4 years ago

Is there really any software yet that uses the V?

avianes3• 4 years ago

XuanTie C906 is not open-source.

They just open-source a light version of the C906, the OpenC906. For instance OpenC906 does not contain the vector extension.

But even the OpenC906 is only partially open-source. They only disclosed verilog code generated by an internal tool, so the real design source code is not open. Worse, they don't open source testbenchs which makes any modification or verification very tedious.

api• 4 years ago

This looks just like the venerable Tandy 100!

http://www.oldcomputers.net/trs100.html

That can't be a coincidence.

lizardactivist• 4 years ago

Very cool little thing, and it looks like something straight out of a sci-fi movie.

snvzz16• 4 years ago

I'll skip this one, and wait for RVA22-compliant devices.

This machine uses the Allwinner D1[0] SoC, which is pre-standard V, incompatible with the standard V extension ratified in December.

Even if not enabling/using the V, and thus considering it just RV64GC, it is a fairly slow one relative to what's already available in the market, and it comes with just one core.

I already have the ~$21 LicheeRV w/Dock[1], which uses the same D1 SoC. IMHO much more cost efficient if you want to play with D1.

[0] https://linux-sunxi.org/D1

[1] https://linux-sunxi.org/Sipeed_Lichee_RV

_vdpp• 4 years ago

Thanks for pointing out RVA22 - I wasn’t aware of the initiative but it’s a great idea. I still have reservations about the core architecture but having some standards for the rest of the ecosystem is a big win.

Pet_Ant• 4 years ago

For those not familiar of RVA22 documentation of it is here: https://github.com/riscv/riscv-profiles/blob/main/profiles.a...

Essentially it is shortform for standardising a set of optional instruction sets into a bundle. RV for RISC-V, A for "applcation supporting" (as opposed to being used in embedded or microcontroller) and 22 for 2022 (in 2100 it'll be 100)

snvzz16• 4 years ago

Essentially it is shortform for standardising a set of optional instruction sets into a bundle.

This is a common misconception. RVA22 is not just a bunch of profiles, but 2022's OS-A Platform.

Platforms do, among many things, require profiles, which are what you've described. In this particular case the RVA22 platform requires the RVA22 profiles.

From your link, documenting profiles, there's an entire section[0] addressing the difference.

The actual platform specification can be found here[1].

[0] https://github.com/riscv/riscv-profiles/blob/main/profiles.a...

[1] https://github.com/riscv/riscv-platform-specs/blob/main/risc...

amelius• 4 years ago

What does it cost to make a case and keyboard like that? I guess they used injection molding?

1MachineElf• 4 years ago

Yes, it's injection molded. Here you can see some of the mold sprues that come with the kit: https://static.wixstatic.com/media/3833f7_352ac21900e64720a5...

LAC-Tech3• 4 years ago

What's the significance of RISC-V?

Easier to write compiler backends for? Faster? Simpler?

RyJones2• 4 years ago

Open source ISA - no licensing fees.

LAC-Tech3• 4 years ago

What does that mean in practice - easier for people to manufacture hardware for them?

chmod600• 4 years ago

Simple ISA is easier to implement. You can have a naive/slow/cheap chip that can run the same programs as a cutting-edge high-performance chip.

kragen19• 4 years ago

RISC-V requires less hardware complexity, and I think GigaDevice's GD32VF microcontrollers have gotten lower energy usage out of that (compared to the otherwise identical GD32F microcontrollers with an ARM Cortex-M core). I don't think it's especially easy to write compiler backends for, though I haven't tried yet; the instruction set is nice and small and orthogonal, yes, but most of the time the subset of instructions a compiler backend actually uses on amd64 or whatever is also nice and small and orthogonal. It's much easier to write emulators for, both because the instruction set is small and because, like the MIPS, it has no condition-code flags, a property that has caused consternation among GMP developers. And there is of course a much wider range of logic designs available for RISC-V than for any other architecture, because it's the first open-source architecture that's become popular.

For me one of the biggest draws is that the privileged spec is enormously simpler than the corresponding morass for most other architectures, especially i386 and amd64. Writing a toy, but working, virtual-memory operating-system kernel for RISC-V seems like the kind of thing you could do in a weekend rather than a semester. And that's enormously freeing.

Trouble is, almost all the actual physical RISC-V hardware I've seen so far seems to be microcontroller-oriented, so it doesn't have an MMU, so it doesn't support this stuff. SiFive has sold some boards called HiFive Unmatched and HiFive Unleashed with multi-core RISC-V CPUs they built that I'm pretty sure did have MMUs (since you could run Linux on them), but they're gone now (https://www.mouser.com/ProductDetail/SiFive/HF105-000?qs=zW3...).

So something like the Allwinner D1 seems really appealing. Just, not saddled with a keyboard that's both too big to fit in my pocket and too small to actually type on. The Clockwork Pi would be a good fit — but 64 MiB is pretty small for running modern Linux.

snvzz16• 4 years ago

Look into the Lichee RV.

musicale• 4 years ago

Some time after MIPS shot itself in the head by killing MIPS Open, it's nice to have a reasonably well designed and well-supported open architecture and instruction set.

edit: apparently there are open versions of SPARC and POWER, so... maybe there's not a lot of value in RISC-V except that it's simpler than the other two, drops irritating legacy features (register windows, condition codes...) and is in general designed for modern implementation?

ge964• 4 years ago

Unpopular opinion, I don't know what's the deal with these small keyboards... like you're not going to be able to do work on that long term.

hsbauauvhabzb2• 4 years ago

If you care about ergonomics you wouldn’t use a laptop, let alone a slab PC.

ge964• 4 years ago

Depends on the laptop size 13" personally is the size I go for/usable but yeah normally I use a 65-8% mechanical keyboard.

Cthulhu_2• 4 years ago

It's not a device intended to do work on long term.

hestefisk• 4 years ago

I would love a little stationary riscv computer like this, which I can plug my own monitor and keyboard into. Does that exist?

snvzz16• 4 years ago

The Lichee RV with its Dock does cost ~$21 and is more or less what you describe.

Notably, this is the same chip used in the computer discussed in this story.

[0] https://linux-sunxi.org/Sipeed_Lichee_RV

BirAdam• 4 years ago

You can plug a monitor, keyboard, and mouse into the DevTerm.

mlindner• 4 years ago

In recent years I've become more and more worried that work on RISC-V is just a way of empowering non-democratic governments the world over by giving them an escape hatch out of western controlled IPs. Yes it's better that these things are not controlled by big companies and yes this should improve innovation in the hardware space but what are we trading off when we get that benefit?

zozbot234• 4 years ago

That's not a bad thing by any means. It's making the best of a bad situation (non-democratic governments that are, to varying extents, anti-West) by incenting those governments to cooperate with the West on open alternatives to proprietary IP. Since such cooperation would basically never happen if it wasn't for the open IP-alternatives being available (they would develop proprietary IP of their own instead, as we've seen so many times already!) I'd call that a pretty good deal!

Wesxdz• 4 years ago

Sounds like a soft vulnerable world hypothesis. I think it's training, collaboration, motivation, and funding of engineers that really matters though. I think what's happening in Ukraine shows that as long as brain drain happens it doesn't matter if knowledge is open because it cannot be used effectively.

hajile2• 4 years ago

They already did designs based on Alpha and MIPS ISAs. That genie definitely isn’t going back into the bottle.

Instead, we’ve moved to limit their ability to manufacture. All the chip plans in the world are worthless if you can’t fabricate them. ASML was largely funded with US DoD money and they seem to have veto power when it comes to exports.

Russia’s cutting edge tech is something like 180nm with promised for 90/65nm still being pipe dreams.

China has managed small amounts of 32nm and talks about 22/14nm stuff, but they can’t get new equipment and all of that is mostly gleaned from the US outsourcing so much.

This puts these countries 10-20 years behind and that’s if we don’t consider the nodes that are essentially complete, but waiting on the resources to build them out.

monocasa3• 4 years ago

SMIC's 14nm has been in full production for years now at this point, and is rumored to have TSMC equivalent yields. The Kirin 710A is one example of a production chip made on that node.

China has been effectively cut off from EUV steppers, but has used that fact to put a lot of money into developing their own by any means necessary. They have a pretty decent track record of developing manufacturing experience in something when they get cut off from importing it.

eunos• 4 years ago

The conflation of ideology and tech as shown in this post is even more reasons to have indigenous and maybe open IP to prevent "west" blockade. The non-democratic Chinese dont give a shit about the ideology of their customer. I prefer tech and commerce be that way instead of an avenue of virtue signalling.

snvzz16• 4 years ago

RISC-V Foundation was brilliant in their timely relocation to Switzerland.

It prevented RISC-V from being embargoed by this sort of thinking, and did go a long way to promote it among those seeking technological sovereignty.

Aardwolf• 4 years ago

I love the look of it! Those rotating knobs look great to use compared to fiddly buttons or touch interfaces. No matter how "modern" touch interfaces are, the human body doesn't change and benefits from tactile feedback and immediate control (I don't know what the knobs do but if it's for example brightness, that's fantastic! I got a monitor that makes it harder to change brightness, than to enable a gaming crosshair...)

gangstead• 4 years ago

The knobs on the side? They turn a quarter turn and the front and back half of the housing come apart.

smilespray• 4 years ago

What? I thought they were programmable. That would have been a selling point for me.

This is like the classic home button on an iPhone being a tool for detaching the screen from the back of the phone.

pingsl• 4 years ago

I am very excited to see the RISC-V devices come to the end users.

Then I am thinking how this device could fit into my daily life. I am wondering what are the typical scanrios for portable computers these days?

snvzz16• 4 years ago

A portable computer people tend to fit into their daily life is their smartphone.

Android RISC-V port was demonstrated over a year ago. I fully expect some RISC-V smartphones will hit the market as soon as chips with high performance cores are ready.

Realistically, that means RVA22 (TBA in spring) + 6 month (assuming best case scenario immediate tapeout) + whatever time it takes to validate such a device built around the new chip.

I would say 2023H1, if I had to guess.

throwaway81523• 4 years ago

I use a small laptop for pretty much all my daily life stuff. I do have a phone that I use for occasional mobile web access, navigation, etc. but my main computer is a laptop. I rarely browse or surf with the phone. I'd like to have a small linux tablet that I can use familiar dev tools on, but the inkplate 10 looks more attractive to me than this weird slab-like thing. The slab thing inherits too much from gaming devices, imho. Nothing wrong with gaming if that's what you're into, but the TRS-100 of yore was revered as a writing device and its keyboard was better suited for that purpos.

butterisgood• 4 years ago

Looks like neck pain waiting to happen

jbirer• 4 years ago

This is a very dangerous precedent for RISC-V.

Allwinner is known as a champion in GPL violations, obfuscating technical details and keeping binary blobs. This defeats the entire purpose of RISC-V and creates an environment similar to what is now for ARM (everything locked down, everything opaque).

The advertisement is basically false advertisement, this is no computer for "free hackers" but another locked down SCB with a non free core.

ngcc_hk2• 4 years ago

Problem of Arm is not arm itself. Competition especially now with apple there meant they cannot close themselves to free software. The problem of arm is their peripheral like gpu (Pi).

For RISC-v, on top of worry it is (a) all just trying to support a 10xrussian empire to be so no sanction later; (b) only the hardware guy concern address and even that a bit … we are still face all these bob of non-open things.

Why bother?

Helping evil?

ngcc_hk2• 4 years ago

Btw nearly buy one as I love the design. But the more I read here, I stop myself.

But that design is great.

The first RISC-V portable computer is now available

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