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Kickstarter For Open Source GPU

Posted by Unknown on from the let's-try-this-one-more-time dept.

First time accepted submitter eekee writes "The targets are high, but so is the goal: releasing Verilog source code for a GPU implementation. The source will be open source, LGPL-licensed, and suitable for loading onto an FPGA. The first target is for a 2D GPU with PCI interface; perhaps not terribly interesting in itself, but the first stretch goal is much more exciting: full OpenGL and Direct3D graphics." Unlike the Open Graphics Project, this is starting from a working 2D accelerator and mostly working 3D accelerator cloning the features of the Number Nine Ticket to Ride hardware. If they get a meelion bucks they'll overhaul the chip to support something other than PCI (although you can bridge between PCI and PCIe) and implement a modern programmable rather than fixed-function chip. Also unlike OGP, they do not appear interested in producing hardware, instead focusing entirely on the core itself for use in FPGAs (anyone want to dust off the OGD1 design?)

5 of 108 comments (clear)

  1. This is hardware by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

    A lot tougher to get right than software. In software you can implement anything you want, as badly as you want. It doesn't cost anything and it's easy to start over. So what if you have an open source GPU? How are you going to connect it to the computer? You need an above-hobbyist PCB designer (sorry, it's true), you need someone to build the boards, test them, solder on the parts (assuming you were able to make a schematic and a BOM and order the parts), test again, and then you can start debugging software as maybe hardware bugs come out at the same time.

    1. Re:This is hardware by tlhIngan · · Score: 3

      A lot tougher to get right than software. In software you can implement anything you want, as badly as you want. It doesn't cost anything and it's easy to start over. So what if you have an open source GPU? How are you going to connect it to the computer? You need an above-hobbyist PCB designer (sorry, it's true), you need someone to build the boards, test them, solder on the parts (assuming you were able to make a schematic and a BOM and order the parts), test again, and then you can start debugging software as maybe hardware bugs come out at the same time.

      Not really - PCI (not PCIe) is fairly easy these days (it's 33MHz, so it's not "hard"). And since it's an FPGA, you just need one with a PCI compatible interface. The other parts would be a video DAC to output to VGA or an FPGA with TMDS lines (yes, they make those) to hook to DVI directly.

      Connect to a computer is easy - it's PCI, most modern PCs have one. If not, they make PCIe-to-PCI bridges that do the same thing (albeit with more work). Or I'm sure if you look around, there's a reference design card you can have that has PCIe, an FPGA and a variety of connectors and ports for plugging straight into a PC.

      And hobby manufacturing is actually fairly easy these days - given how kickstarter seems to have spawned a small industry of contract manufacturers and such with pick and place machines and all that that are reasonably affordable to use to build a small (under 1000, above 20 or so) run with.

      No, the biggest problem these guys will encounter is it's impossible to do an open-source GPU. Because everything they need to do is patented, some of it quite heavily (like S3TC - a core part of OpenGL and DirectX these days, of which there is a software and a hardware part, all owned by Via).

      And that's just 3D graphics. 2D graphics is also a minefield (stuff like overlays are patented). Or if you want to do hardware assisted video decode (patent minefield! Even if you don't want to do h.264). Since the drivers are probably going to be open, that means pushing a lot of the patented material into hardware.

      Hell, the hardware is to be honest the easiest part. Even doing the GPU is fairly straightforward.

  2. Re:Dubious Market? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Informative

    The point of this is NOT to produce a graphics card you'll stick in your PC. The card they're emulating was released in 1998. It's for embedded system designers to add graphics capabilities to a project that's already using an FPGA without completely reinventing the wheel. Speaking as someone who implemented a (very basic) 3D GPU for a class project once, it is quite a lot of work.

  3. Re:utterly utterly worthless by Tapewolf · · Score: 4, Interesting

    With the rise of ARM, SoC parts with fully open GPU APIs of amazing power are essentially almost ZERO cost. Tiny circuit boards are available for experimenters and developers with first class 2D, 3D, Video and JPG acceleration, and even video ENCODING is becoming a common hardware feature in low-end parts.

    Care to name any? Most of the ones I've heard of with any form of acceleration are using a proprietary GPU core, where you get a binary blob for Android and bugger-all else. Maybe things have changed since, but last I hard the driver situation was worse for ARM cores than it was in the PC space. Indeed, that was the rationale behind Mir - that it would be able to use the Android blobs under Ubuntu.

  4. As am embedded developer.. by xtal · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Open reference designs are invaluable.. they allow integration of this into an existing design or SoC, but more interestingly, provide an easy platform to customize at the hardware level.

    --
    ..don't panic