Re:Google offers free fabbing for 130nm open-source chips
by snovv_crash on Wednesday July 08, 2020 @02:06AM
(#23767321)
You wouldn't get access to ASIC fab just to make a CPU. Fill it with tensor cores, or fft cores, plus a big memory bus. Put custom image processing algorithms on it. Then it will be competitive with modern general silicon despite the node handicap.
Re:Google offers free fabbing for 130nm open-source chips
by yummypaint on Tuesday July 07, 2020 @05:18PM
(#23764191)
Your suggestion was more what i was thinking, perhaps something more limited in scope than a general processor. An application that comes to mind is an intentionally simple and auditable device for e2e encryption.
You could probably close some of the single thread gap with architectural improvements, but your real problems are going to be power consumption and that you'd have to quadruple the die size if you wanted so much as a quad core.
The interesting uses might be to go the other way. Give yourself like a 10W power budget and make the fastest dual core you can within that envelope, and use it for things that don't need high performance, the sort of thing where you'd use a Raspberry Pi.