Re:Alibaba partner announces 16 core RISC-V chip
by lsllc on Thursday July 25, 2019 @10:36AM
(#20525709)
Any industry needs competition! Sadly the consolidation of the [server] processor market over the last decade from half a dozen or more very different designs (which had collectively driven computing for the last 30+ years) has left us with the duopoly of Intel who's not really innovating and ARM who kind of are, but mostly in mobile.
Obviously, RISC-V also needs software support; gcc supports it, Golang has added RISC-V as a target (although it's not yet implemented) and there are several projects working on LLVM (e.g. lowRISC and SiFive's port). Having played around with the Fedora-RISCV port under QEMU, it's actually surprisingly good thus far.
Having an open-source processor design with good software support that anyone can manufacture without royalties is a good thing and will hopefully spur both Intel and ARM into innovation.
Obviously, RISC-V also needs software support; gcc supports it, Golang has added RISC-V as a target (although it's not yet implemented) and there are several projects working on LLVM (e.g. lowRISC and SiFive's port). Having played around with the Fedora-RISCV port under QEMU, it's actually surprisingly good thus far.
Having an open-source processor design with good software support that anyone can manufacture without royalties is a good thing and will hopefully spur both Intel and ARM into innovation.