Thanks Jan. That's the sort of things I'm thinking. You should google spram and see
the different storage memory definitions it gives.
I've been continuing to explore things in time background and have made a
lot of progress, bit nowhere near the low energy levels I'm looking at. Of course, I'm
looking for lowest energy levels, for a few different purposes.
However, a number of things I've said in the past here, some smarties try to drown
out, it turns out smarter minds are also actively pursuing. Such as multiple
chip packages in 2D or 3D using "chiplets". Intel foundry services is using. I'm
currently struggling to keep awake watching a video on it, with yet another crazed
sounding narrator grind away on my nerves. So, my ambition to stack a now
"chiplet" sram like die in a multichip package with high speed die to die signaling
(yes, the video sounds familiar) to a processor core, looks like becoming a reality
(please note, you don't need a fan to mix and put chiplets into a multiple chip package).
So good when reality proves the usual negative for the sake of mouthing off,
suspects wrong.
https://youtu.be/z89ysU4RwIg
My thought, is that a chip like the ga144 could use such a cheap memory psram chiplet
in package. But, I don't know how many cycles the chip takes up to perform one
instruction cycle. I presumed a number, but realised last night, you could just sacrifice
a few cores to synchronise a stream of memory fetches to another core. Maybe not 700mhz, but then not many
cost effective simple external memories will go near that fast.
I've decided as the project is likely to get 10,000 or so sales at max but needs to be below
$40 to get those sales, I could land up doing $100k of work for $10k, so am looking
at making it a community project using a small cheap development board. Also, due
to possible hassles with HDMI requiring a $10k license per product, and no board
small enough, coming with a HDMI licensed function and port, I've decided to scrap
that and explore a lower latency version of Miracast or one of the USB video
standards where the user buys a USB to HDMI adaptor. But also looking at a custom
wireless or wired transmission. I could literally do HDMI over cat or optical
instead, and basically support an embedded cable with HDMI end on it.
Here is a Arduino wifi RiscV development board I'm checking out. It's around 21
mm by 17mm. There are slightly smaller, but they are a lot slower, lack features, and
wifi, avr or pic. But, there is a very small fpga board under development. There are a few
such fpga boards. If only the chip in the seed Xia one below supported graphics and
HDMI, it would be great. Unfortunately, it seems all the
chips at this level lack something that could easily have been supported. At the
moment, I'm trying to find out if the chip even has support for Miracast. I forecast a long
time ago, that there would be such chips that would have enough resources to be used
for more general purposes. A number have been made to do VGA (pic and avr etc,
simply, and I have found some ideas to convert SD VGA to DVI, which is
compatible with HDMI which should be able to be done through a converter plug),
there is a HDMI shield/hat for one or two to support software configured HDMI
output. Unfortunately, no wifi enabled mcu board of that chip is available at that
size. The RiscV version might be less useful, and only has been just released. So
close! At this level in the ranges, it's incredibly easy to completely miss out, with no
adequate workaround possible. I'm still trying to ascertain if that RiscV model
has hardware for graphics at all, or of another model which might appear in a board
people can buy.
They have some sort of product manufacturing service scheme. Amazon has
another one that has partners for that. But, that is going towards the future. A lot of
engineering consumer products is for certifications, safety and manufacture. The
business is building an organisation, administration, sales, distribution chain,
marketing, insurance etc. Even if you just license, that's a lot of ongoing fees, and
costs to negotiate and license. To design a product, have somebody else tidy up
the design for manufacture and certifications then manufacture license and/or
sell for the designer. You then are freed up to work on something else. I'm going
have look into these things. Life is fast and what you can do gets shorter.
https://www.seeedstudio.com/Seeed-XIAO-ESP32C3-p-5431.html
There are also slightly larger boards from elsewhere, with little oled screens on them.
Here is that 13.1x9.5mm inside USB connector fpga card with the ice40 you like
Jan:
https://github.com/im-tomu/fomu-hardware/tree/master/archive/pvt
https://github.com/im-tomu/fomu-hardware#readme
https://tomu.im/fomu.html
This one has a chip with mcu and fpga:
https://tomu.im/qomu.html
Here is a different one without fpga but with wifi:
https://tomu.im/womu.html
The original model:
https://tomu.im/tomu.html
https://tomu.im/
https://www.crowdsupply.com/sutajio-kosagi/tomu
https://www.crowdsupply.com/img/3eef/tomu-size-scale_jpg_md-xl.jpg
Here is tiny circuits. People have got VGA out of chips in the size range, but haven't
looked these up. However the VGA ones were similar size.
https://tinycircuits.com/collections/tinylily-platform/products/tinylily-mini-processor
Here are some other small ones:
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/melbel/pico-the-worlds-smallest-arduino-board/description
Yep this one is actually a different product with the same name from somebody
else:
https://mellbell.cc/products/pico
0.6 inch square
https://www.cnx-software.com/2020/01/20/piskey-atto-tiny-arduino-board-castellated-holes/
20.32 x 12.7mm
Another company with a smaller one of the same name:
https://time4ee.com/news.php?readmore=468
11.5 X 10.3mm. Getting closer.
32 bit:
https://www.electronics-lab.com/nerdonic-atom-x1-worlds-smallest-32-bit-arduino-compatible-board/
14.9 x 14.9 x 4.4mm
Wifi module iot:
https://www.electronics-lab.com/blkbox-bb-e01p-worlds-smallest-esp8285-based-wifi-module/
10×14 mm
Here's a ATiny85 chip:
https://forum.arduino.cc/t/the-smallest-micro-processor/893371/2
https://makersportal.com/shop/attiny85-microcontroller
How do I make a custom board for that :). It's getting close to the minium usable
pins for the minimum feature configuration. I don't know of this one is suitable, but I'm
looking around at something lile this. There is a 3c micro video here I haven't looked at.
https://www.olimex.com/Products/Duino/AVR/OLIMEXINO-85S/open-source-hardware
(16.9x12.7)mm
Interesting to look at things like this and wifi modules. To find one that has spare
capacity to accept and process a signal then output it as HDMI over Ethernet, and
use a HDMI to ethernet adaptor cable.
https://www.olimex.com/Products/Modules/Ethernet/ENC28J60-H/
30x24 mm
Now, I was looking at anti-fuse fpga many years back due to lower power and higher
performance. But the technology was taken away from the market. 5Ghz
technology. However, it looks like it's out there, but 400mhz I notice (have been pretty sick
and haven't read into it all yet). I'm pretty interested in technology and services that
allow a gate array structure to be set with performance and low energy closer to an
custom ASIC chip, and cheap. I see there is a form of on chip storage used on some
MCU's (I forget the name of it) which might be useful for an gatearray. They change
the resistance of the material to block or allow circuit paths. I actually had an
alternative idea for something to archieve this, and just realised an even
simpler alternative. There seems to be a few things out there to archieve such an
effect. I also found I have a link to magnetic fpga, which I forgot.
https://www.quicklogic.com/products/fpga/fpgas-antifuse/
https://www.quicklogic.com/products/efpga/antifuse-efpga/
And here they have a CPU with fpga used in one of the products I looked at:
https://www.quicklogic.com/products/soc/eos-s3-microcontroller/
However, the energy consumption is not as low as I like, but this is probably not
an anti-fuse product. GA was a good opportunity to produce processors to go on the
different types of fpga product here. You start with a single node with conventional
memory bus, and offer stay versions with that bus. The fpga manufacturer gets a tiny
high speed low energy cheap processor that makes many softcores pointless. Combine
that with a fine-grain fpga structure (you only use as much energy as what portion
of the circuit you are using, which can by a lot less with the GA). The designer can
use the single core or array as much as they like, and the dogs as little. The GA portion
can outcompete the FPGA portion on energy to acertain degree. Now, what you get is
parts mostly fpga of conventional size, with one or more node GA array. Fpga,
that are smaller but with one or more GA nodes in an array. Ones which are largely GA
and ones which are only GA, due to its ability to outcompete in some areas,
even emulating an RiscV or Arm. But memory servicing is the key. At least one node, if
not at least one on a side, have to be able to fully address and execute out of
memory, without delay. That maximizes certain tasks and emulation, and allows the
array's use to be more. It's a simple adjustment to the present scheme. A little node
network handling adjustment would all add significant function. But seriously, I think
that chip was a max of 4.5 watts or something before burn out. I forget. There was
one chip that had many power aspects, but left the typical maximum power
consumption blank. I wasn't so well, so it was a huge headache to realise it just was
going be a big number compared to a GA node which of with full external bus could
deliver more performance cheaper with lower energy. But, hey, maybe I'm wrong.
So, anyway. Things haven't been going so well, and everything has stalled out on
the projects. I'm being played with, and things threatened to stretch out, requiring actions I
don't like which should be unnecessary instead. At the same time post covid
symptoms big time, accidentally getting cyanide poisoning (turns out one of
the things allows this to happen) accidentally poisoning with Lugol's, some
strange non covid flu, my old cancer coming up at the same time and not able to
action things, too much to do, too many other things going wrong (not mentioned here),
all at the same time. Now I'm regaining some fortitude (that post covid symptoms was a
lot), I've got to get back to catching up.