RISC architecture has really changed everything

Correct. We were here before. A second battle of architecture.

IN HackerA group of teenagers obsessed with RISC had to prevent a goat villain from being overtied by a fleet of oil -carrying tankers by computer virus. In the photo here, from left to: Lord Nikon, Dade, Kate and cereal killers.

Photo: Everett collection

It is difficult to say exceeding how this can be handled. To consider: Patterson invented RISC in 1980 and fought the established ISA. He won. Thirty years later, his disciples invented Risc for a new era, and he and they went to fight with the successful company that guaranteed RISC's heritage from the beginning: ARM.

In response to Patterson's article, ARM shot back by a reject, in the case of licensed guidelines. No one wants some random Isa, not controlled, not supported, they said. Customers who want to succeed, standards, an ecosystem have been proven. What are the resources needed to equip and re -program everything for a new Isa? Without enough cash in the world, ARM mocked.

The RISC-V community disagrees. They create their own ecosystems under the auspices of RISC-V International and start adjusting RISC-V according to the needs of modern computers. Some supporters began calling it a Viking open source hardware movement, even if Hardcore Risc-did not love this phrase. Hardware, placed in a literal sense, exactly open source, and besides that, RISC-V is not calculated, completely, is a hardware. That is hardware software interfacemiss. But, semantics. Important point: Anyone, in any bedroom or garage or office anywhere in the world, can use RISC-V for free to build their own computer from the beginning, to set up their own technology fate.

ARM is right about one thing, although: this has no money. Millions of dollars if not billions of dollars. . As much as ARM, in the 1990s and 2000s, was found success in low-end markets, in 2010, there were also RISC-V: devices with special purpose, car chip in cars, that. Why pay Intel chip or arm license when you don't have to do it?

And people in Berkeley? In 2015, they launched their own company, called SIFIVETo build computer parts based on RISC-V. Meaning: ARM is not only a spiritual enemy for them now. It is a direct competitor.

At that time I went to the Viking's very technical conference in Santa Clara, the ARM-VS.-Risc-V battle has been raging for nearly a decade. I can still feel it everywhere. We wonI have heard many times. No one is happy at the armSomeone declared. . ARM ARM is an asshole, a former SIFIVE director told me. In fact, only one person in the conference seemed to have anything good to talk about the competition. He was working in a demo booth, and when I was surprised that his product was built on a RISC-V processor, he turned a little green and whispered: in fact, it was the arm. Don't tell anyone. Please do not tell anyone.

Bro booth probably worried too much. In the hardware world, people have worked, or have friends, anywhere else. Calista Redmond, the star of the program, spent 12 years at IBM (and recently resorted to RISC-V International for a job at NVIDIA). Even Patterson has a relationship with all places, Intel, although less directly threatens to ARM, is still a RISC-V competitor. It was Intel Grant Money, Patterson happily admitted, paid the architect Berkeley to invent the RISC-V from the beginning. There is no closed source, monopoly large technology, no open source, free small technology. Do not listen to other Hippies technologies; That is always the case.