Re: Support for UT
From: Luis Commins
[ a teeshirt ]
(Maybe with the slogan: 'Don't RISC it, MISC it'?)
Reply from: Keith Wootten
I'll buy one, they sound too good to MISC.
From: Luis Commins
Looks like if we want some FORTH processors, DYOP is better,
but then, it won't bring either performance or price.
From: vic plichota
I really *hate* to say this, but for a verrry long time, the only
satisfactory effort that I've ever seen has been the Harris RTX,
period.
Reply from: Keith Wootten
Are you unaware of the Patriot Scientific PSC1000 (ShBoom) processor?
It's available, (I use it with a simple Forth cross-compiler built with
Win32Forth) and has many MISC features. Its forerunner was designed by
Chuck Moore and, while I don't know the full story, it looks as if
someone took over the design and decided to make it work in a less
quirky way. It's a 32bit twin-stack (on-chip) machine which currently
runs at 100MHz loading four 8 bit instructions at a time. The 10ns
instructions include *many* Forth primitives and it runs Forth very
quickly. In addition there is a set of general purpose registers, and
the return stack can also be accessed as registers if required. The
memory interface is very flexible, and there is also a simple on-chip
I/O processor with priority for time-critical tasks. The device can
also run (more slowly) with 8 bit memory, and a minimum system comprises
uP, ROM, DRAM and Oscillator - no glue required.
While I agree that we should all support Jeff - and you can count me in
for Teeshirts or Newsletters or whatever - it seems to me that, if the
PSC1000 were more widely used, there would be a smaller mental leap for
potential MISC investors. The FPGA approach is interesting, but a
PSC1000 costs $10 in quantity - couple this with a small FPGA to handle
the peripherals, and you have one hell of a system. It's certainly not
as powerful as MISC will hopefully be, but it's real, working,
documented Silicon which can be bought now. Use it or - maybe - lose
it.
While supporting the development of what we would all like to see, let's
use what we already have in real products and projects. I don't have
any connection with Patriot Scientific, but I've used the RTX2001
extensively, and know a good Forth chip when I see one.
See www.ptsc.com for details of ShBoom, Forth inc have a commercial
compiler and show some very interesting benchmarks on their WebSite.
Cheers
--
Keith Wootten
