How hard is to build a processor?
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How hard is to build a processor? Don McKenzie 02-25-2010
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Posted by Don McKenzie on February 25, 2010, 4:57 pm



It seems that “Google” engineer Bill Buzbee isn’t interested in
microprocessors that can be purchased in marked. There is more fun to
build own. Several years ago he built first “Magic-1” processors
, but now he makes its documentations widely available in his project
website.

http://www.embedds.com/how-hard-is-to-build-a-processor/


Cheers Don...


--
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Posted by fritz on February 25, 2010, 5:13 pm



> It seems that “Google” engineer Bill Buzbee isn’t interested in
> microprocessors that can be purchased in marked. There is more fun to
> build own. Several years ago he built first “Magic-1” processors
> , but now he makes its documentations widely available in his project
> website.
> http://www.embedds.com/how-hard-is-to-build-a-processor/

Why not ?
Someone should be keeping the old craft alive. Good on him !
You could ask 'why build museums' ?
I think you agree.





Posted by Jon Kirwan on February 25, 2010, 5:24 pm


wrote:

>It seems that “Google” engineer Bill Buzbee isn’t interested in
>microprocessors that can be purchased in marked. There is more fun to
>build own. Several years ago he built first “Magic-1” processors
>, but now he makes its documentations widely available in his project
>website.
>http://www.embedds.com/how-hard-is-to-build-a-processor/
>Cheers Don...

Thanks, Don. I absolutely LOVE doing this kind of thing. It
should be required work for anyone in embedded programming,
at least. 35 years ago I tried my hand at it and failed to
get much useful. It wasn't until I later got access to a
logic simulator that I was finally able to complete a
successful processor design with 7400 logic, not using the
74181 ALU by the way, though I never built what seemed to
work so well. Later, I picked up a Xilinx 4000 series demo
board and, for the very first time, learned to write VHDL and
finally coded up my first processor that worked!!! (I didn't
do the floorplanning by hand -- way over my head at the
time.)

I learned so much doing this, though.

Anyway, thanks for the link!!

Jon

Posted by James Harris on February 26, 2010, 5:52 am


> wrote:
> >It seems that Google engineer Bill Buzbee isn t interested in
> >microprocessors that can be purchased in marked. There is more fun to
> >build own.

...

> Thanks, Don.  I absolutely LOVE doing this kind of thing.  It
> should be required work for anyone in embedded programming,
> at least.

That reminds me that there are some excellent course videos by David
Culler of Berkeley showing how to build a CPU from logic gates. A bit
of searching for his webcasts for course 61CL Fall 2009 in H.264 video
should bring them up.

I had no idea until working through the lectures that *I* could build
a CPU using components I already knew about. As part of the course he
shows how to do so by working up from logic gates.

James

Posted by Tim Watts on February 26, 2010, 6:18 am


wibbled on Friday 26 February 2010 10:52

>> wrote:
>> >It seems that Google engineer Bill Buzbee isn t interested in
>> >microprocessors that can be purchased in marked. There is more fun to
>> >build own.
>
> ...
>
>> Thanks, Don. I absolutely LOVE doing this kind of thing. It
>> should be required work for anyone in embedded programming,
>> at least.
>
> That reminds me that there are some excellent course videos by David
> Culler of Berkeley showing how to build a CPU from logic gates. A bit
> of searching for his webcasts for course 61CL Fall 2009 in H.264 video
> should bring them up.
>
> I had no idea until working through the lectures that *I* could build
> a CPU using components I already knew about. As part of the course he
> shows how to do so by working up from logic gates.
>
> James

I knew a chap (York University Computing Services) who claimed to have a
mate who built an elementary CPU from fruit machine relays[1]. Occupied a
bit of board about one square yard. He lost interest in building RAM from
more relays, so wedged a 1k RAM chip with suitable interfacing on the side.
Ran at about 1 IPS apparently...

[1] he got a box load from a surplus store, old stripped out ones. Had an
unusual contact configuration that made them quite suitable.

--
Tim Watts

Managers, politicians and environmentalists: Nature's carbon buffer.


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