| 1.5 Ghz Fabric Speed: How Fast Can You Make Natami | page 1 2
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Chuck T
USA
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Posts 678
15 Apr 2011 15:30
| "Achronix (RAM based, 1.5 GHz fabric speed) who will be building their chips on Intels' state-of-the art 22 nm process"
Quoted from:EXTERNAL LINK
Just how fast could you make the Natami go? I looked and I don't know if this is a consumer product as there were no prices.
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Gunnar von Boehn
Germany
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Posts 5775
15 Apr 2011 17:15
| Hi Chuck, those Achronix Speedsters are nice. We had quite a detailed look at them. But what do we want with an AMIGA Blitter running at 500 Mhz?
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Samuel D Crow
USA
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Posts 1295
15 Apr 2011 18:03
| Gunnar von Boehn wrote:
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But what do we want with an AMIGA Blitter running at 500 Mhz?
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Do you mean by itself? If so, then it won't help much. @Chuck I think the Cyclone IV chips will be pretty full when we're done. Small capacity chips won't help much even if they are faster.
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Megol .
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Posts 680
15 Apr 2011 18:27
| With unlimited money?
An 8GHz single-core 68k compatible processor, 1GHz Chipset with 3D accelerator of middle-end notebook class.
It would require spray cooling to avoid destroying the 300W chip...To get close to the advertised performance on the Achronix chips one have to use deep pipelines which isn't optimal for processor design. High end FPGA chips tend to be very expensive ($15000+).
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Marcel Verdaasdonk
Netherlands
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Posts 3979
15 Apr 2011 19:49
| Megol how i am looking it at it i don't know how the team can make the 68050 fit in the chip without having to slow down to communicate over the bus to the chipset. Having the mayor parts in a single chip is a blessing here.
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Chuck T
USA
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Posts 678
16 Apr 2011 18:55
| Marcel Verdaasdonk wrote:
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Megol how i am looking it at it i don't know how the team can make the 68050 fit in the chip without having to slow down to communicate over the bus to the chipset.
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Reprogrammable Chips Could Enable Instant Gadget Upgrades
EXTERNAL LINK
I was reading about this brand of FPGAs being different than the old one because the new ones allow hardware changes and not just software ones. It may be a few years until a good chip is available for newer Natami changes.
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Marcel Verdaasdonk
Netherlands
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Posts 3979
16 Apr 2011 19:32
| if it doesn't fit in the chip it doesn't fix Chuck you should read it again. ;)
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Gunnar von Boehn
Germany
| | (Moderator)
Posts 5775
16 Apr 2011 19:33
| Marcel Verdaasdonk wrote:
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if it doesn't fit in the chip it doesn't fix Chuck you should read it again. ;)
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What is your point?
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Marcel Verdaasdonk
Netherlands
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Posts 3979
16 Apr 2011 20:22
| there is no notion of size in the article.
So i assume this is still either on small scale small logic or theory.
Both are relevant but I have to add what would be the added value?First let it be proven then let's see what team members can get out of it.
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Chuck T
USA
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Posts 678
17 Apr 2011 02:01
| Marcel Verdaasdonk wrote:
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First let it be proven then let's see what team members can get out of it.
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According to Leon: The smallest one is $200 (large quantity price) and they are only interested in high-end applications at present such as: * LTE, EPC, WiMAX, 4G Wireless Backhaul
* 40G/100G Ethernet
* Carrier-Grade Ethernet
* Fixed Mobile Convergence
* Video Networks and IPTV
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JeeBee McJibble
United Kingdom
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Posts 85
17 Apr 2011 05:19
| Marcel Verdaasdonk wrote:
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if it doesn't fit in the chip it doesn't fix Chuck you should read it again. ;)
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The idea seems to be to 'simulate' a large FPGA by reconfiguring the hardware of a smaller cheaper device at 1.5GHz speeds, and storing signal state between hardware configurations. So to the end user it looks like a massive programmable device, but in reality it's a small one with multiple personalities.
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Gunnar von Boehn
Germany
| | (Moderator)
Posts 5775
17 Apr 2011 07:40
| People please mind that you are talking here about two different products.
Acronix is not Tabula.
I have looked at both companies.
To me Acronix product looks quite convincing.At the time I was looking at it Tabula was not able to demonstrate.
Some time ago, Tabula made the impression of beeing only a "garage company".
Tabula did at that time not have any sales people nor even a secretary you could call or which would even answer emails.
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Gunnar von Boehn
Germany
| | (Moderator)
Posts 5775
17 Apr 2011 08:32
| Chuck T wrote:
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The smallest one is $200 (large quantity price) and they are only interested in high-end applications at present such as:
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Their prices used to be comparable to Virtex 5/ Virtex6 pricing.
'Large quantity' means numbers where producing a hardcopy or real Asic would be the cheaper solution!
Acronix is nice, but you need to mind that if you take like 100 chips for an AMIGA card you have to pay $1500 price per FPGA.
So the question is:
* How much would you want to spend for the FPGA?
1) Would you spend $100-200 for a very good FPGA
2) Or would you like to spend $2000 for a high end FPGA?
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Megol .
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Posts 680
17 Apr 2011 16:39
| Gunnar von Boehn wrote:
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People please mind that you are talking here about two different products.
Acronix is not Tabula.
I have looked at both companies.
To me Acronix product looks quite convincing.
At the time I was looking at it Tabula was not able to demonstrate.
Some time ago, Tabula made the impression of beeing only a "garage company".
Tabula did at that time not have any sales people nor even a secretary you could call or which would even answer emails.
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With the budget and people involved I'd like to see that garage...
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Marcel Verdaasdonk
Netherlands
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Posts 3979
17 Apr 2011 16:49
| all it takes is a idea, someone that has knowledge how to design a IC.(just call one of the foundries for help)
A machine and the right CAD/CAM tools.Megol it is easier then you think. Besides If you would just look at the Natami project would you say it's just a hobby? (AFAICS this is a labor of love for some team members)
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Megol .
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Posts 680
17 Apr 2011 16:56
| Marcel Verdaasdonk wrote:
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all it takes is a idea, someone that has knowledge how to design a IC.(just call one of the foundries for help)
A machine and the right CAD/CAM tools.
Megol it is easier then you think.
Besides If you would just look at the Natami project would you say it's just a hobby? (AFAICS this is a labor of love for some team members)
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I don't know why you are referring to me?
Yes it's easy. 2 years with some skilled people and a multi-million budget.
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Wojtek P
Poland
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Posts 1597
17 Apr 2011 21:31
| Chuck T wrote:
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"Achronix (RAM based, 1.5 GHz fabric speed) who will be building their chips on Intels' state-of-the art 22 nm process"
Quoted from:
EXTERNAL LINK
Just how fast could you make the Natami go? I looked and I don't know if this is a consumer product as there were no prices.
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How COSTLY would it me. Read more about prices of Achronix FPGAs :)
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Wojtek P
Poland
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Posts 1597
17 Apr 2011 21:35
| Gunnar von Boehn wrote:
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Chuck T wrote:
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The smallest one is $200 (large quantity price) and they are only interested in high-end applications at present such as:
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Their prices used to be comparable to Virtex 5/ Virtex6 pricing.
'Large quantity' means numbers where producing a hardcopy or real Asic would be the cheaper solution!
Acronix is nice, but you need to mind that if you take like 100 chips for an AMIGA card you have to pay $1500 price per FPGA.
So the question is:
* How much would you want to spend for the FPGA?
1) Would you spend $100-200 for a very good FPGA
2) Or would you like to spend $2000 for a high end FPGA?
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And how much other things have to be changed. AT LEAST DDR3-1600 to make things balanced. Still - latencies would be relatively too high to keep current design.
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Reperatorium Kwaku85
Poland
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Posts 40
17 Apr 2011 22:07
| Megol . wrote:
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With unlimited money?
An 8GHz single-core 68k compatible processor, 1GHz Chipset with 3D accelerator |
I'm affraid Your Workbench will crash at Your LCD glass in booting at this speed :D
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Gunnar von Boehn
Germany
| | (Moderator)
Posts 5775
18 Apr 2011 09:03
| People, what is your opinion do you think that its good for visitors to posts there speculations here? For example: Marcel posted that the NATAMI would not fit into the Speedster - this is nonsense of course it does fit into this FPGA. Wojtek posted that the memory latency would be to high to keep the design, this is also non-sense. I'm not that happy with people here posting untrue claims as facts and thereby confusing other users. The real problem with the Speedster is the price.
The Speedster is a high end chip, like Stratix or Virtex.
This means you pay over $1000 per FPGA for this.
If course if you order them in millions of units then they get much cheaper - but this does not help us. One item needs also to be clarified.
The 1.5 Ghz are maximum clockrate - this does NOT mean that a random FPGA design will come close to this.
The Speedster is designed to run pipelined logic without dependancies at high speed. This means the Speedster will enhance the Blitter and the 3DCore - it will give little or no benefit for the 68K CPU core. Does this clear up some questions?
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Do you have questions about the Natami?