[HN Gopher] Mini-review: The Clockwork Pi DevTerm R-01, or RISC-...
       ___________________________________________________________________
        
       Mini-review: The Clockwork Pi DevTerm R-01, or RISC-V on the go
        
       Author : todsacerdoti
       Score  : 51 points
       Date   : 2022-05-29 15:18 UTC (7 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (www.talospace.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (www.talospace.com)
        
       | DeathArrow wrote:
       | >I've observed that there are two main markets for OpenPOWER
       | workstations, namely people who want to support alternatives to
       | the x86-ARM duopoly
       | 
       | There is no duopoly. There's just x86.
        
         | pointlessone wrote:
         | If you only consider PC/server market then yes. But I'm fairly
         | confident any given household has more ARM chips in it than x86
         | CPUs.
        
           | hulitu wrote:
           | But you cannot use your household ARM computers. They use
           | you.
        
           | rwmj wrote:
           | Even your PC has more non-x86 CPUs than x86.
        
             | hulitu wrote:
             | Some of them are microcontrollers. But the PC still runs on
             | x86.
        
               | vosper wrote:
               | Unless it's a Mac...
        
               | snvzz wrote:
               | Macs are not PCs.
               | 
               | PCs are general purpose computers, the opposite of Apple
               | ecosystem's walled garden.
        
               | vanchor3 wrote:
               | I guess you haven't used a version of Windows from the
               | past several years.
        
               | snvzz wrote:
               | You're right, I haven't. My PC runs something else.
        
       | snvzz wrote:
       | >But after this first personal taste of RISC-V, I don't think
       | OpenPOWER has much to worry about right now.
       | 
       | The D1 is far from the state of the art in RISC-V. It already was
       | a low-end chip when it was released two years ago. What's good
       | about it is the low cost of the modules.
        
         | brucehoult wrote:
         | Exactly! It's a Pi Zero / Pi CM kind of uarch at Pi CM clock
         | speed and performance and (roughly) price.
         | 
         | This 1.0 GHz single-issue in-order CPU gets 37% of the
         | performance of a 3-wide PowerPC G4 at 1.5 GHz (I think he
         | probably means 1.42 GHz).
         | 
         | That seems like a pretty good result to me. At equal clock
         | speeds it would be about 50% the speed.
         | 
         | He also says SiFive's U74 dual-issue in-order "gets by the G5,
         | but by less than you'd think". The actual figure isn't given,
         | and I think he still means G4 there, but that's also pretty
         | good given the much simple uarch and similar clock speed.
         | 
         | And it's 270x faster than the 68030, at only 40 times the clock
         | speed. I remember when I had a IIcx (my first personally-owned
         | computer) and lusted after a cache-card equipped IIci. L2 cache
         | card that is, the 68030 having L1 cache built into the chip.
         | 
         | The D1 isn't a powerhouse. We know that. Treat it like a Pi
         | Zero and you'll be happy. Much faster things are on the way.
        
           | classichasclass wrote:
           | So what CPU would you have recommended for a machine like
           | this? I hear "much faster things" all the time and this is
           | exactly what I mean by the hype machine. What silicon is out
           | there that people can get?
           | 
           | The Mac mini is a 1.5GHz G4. This was the last generation
           | (the "secret clock bump" one).
        
         | [deleted]
        
       ___________________________________________________________________
       (page generated 2022-05-29 23:01 UTC)