Designing an IC

[Ammar]

Hello,

Has anyone designed a chip as part of their hobby experience? I have heard of software like Magic VLSI, which is free and open source. However, it looks as though it has a fairly steep learning curve.

I know it can cost a great deal to get one fabricated but I would be keen to know if anyone has gone down this path. Even if it doesn't get made, is it a good learning experience? Analog, digital, mixed-signal, what have people done, how long can it take and what is the best way to begin? What is the "hello world" of IC design?

[DerekG]

Hello,

Has anyone designed a chip as part of their hobby experience? I have heard of software like Magic VLSI, which is free and open source. However, it looks as though it has a fairly steep learning curve.

Mostly people program an off the shelf microprocessor to do what they want (ie to become their "custom chip") or use (if production numbers will be large) programmable gate arrays.

Everything else is much more expensive (you are talking many tens of thousands of dollars).

[Ammar]

Blueskull, what was the first IC or part of an IC you ever designed?

[PCB.Wiz]

Has anyone designed a chip as part of their hobby experience?

'designed a chip' can mean many things, and even with ASICs, you are not likely to work at mask-level.
Instead you hand over design files, and the FAB consultant runs their $$$ compilers to create mask files.

A more realistic path for all except the very highest volumes, is to use CPLD/FPGA and 'design custom logic' using those.
Those design files can be passed to a FAB consultant, should you ever hit the 8-9 digit volumes needed.

There are a lot of CPLD/FPGA from lattice/micosemi/altera/xilinx et al, and Cypress have PSoC parts with MCU and modest Logic cells.

If you really need an ASIC, and thus do not care about the chip-price, then there was this offer recently

http://www.edacafe.com/sponsors/Baysand/index.20160802.php

That takes FPGA design flow data, and gives 100 chips for $500 each.