FV-1 single chip DSP - how does it compare to "regular" microcontrollers?

[NiHaoMike]

I read about this standalone SDR based on the FV-1 audio DSP:
https://circuitsalad.com/2015/06/19/comming-soon-stand-alone-software-defined-radio-baseband-demodulator-no-computer-required/
The datasheet lists the performance at a pretty modest 6 MIPS, but that's obviously in an instruction set specifically designed for DSP. For that application, how many MIPS of (for example) STM32 is it equivalent to?

[ehughes]

So....

the FV-1 was essentially the same architecture as a old Alesis/Wavefront DSP that was specifically create for Audio/Guitar.     You program in assembly language and it works a bit different than a normal CPU.  There is one master loop. You essential start at the top of the code when a new sample is ready and have a fixed number of instructions afterwards.    Little to no conditionals.  It really is for time domain data flow processing.

The original designer of the FV-1 worked on the Alesis chip and it was his baby.  He passed away over 10 years ago and there were no new chips.

For time domain processing,  it would actually out perform many general purpose MCUs for certain tasks at a low clock rate.  It is tuned from some very specific instructions.     I actually got it to do more than a 100MHz cortex M4 for some DSP tasks.


That being said,  the SigmaDSP from Analog devices work essentially the same way except that has a lot more under the hook and is actively developed.   It works the same way,   you process per sample and have a fixed number of instructions until the next audio sample.   It can do everything the FV-1 can and more.

[SiliconWizard]

That being said,  the SigmaDSP from Analog devices work essentially the same way except that has a lot more under the hook and is actively developed.   It works the same way,   you process per sample and have a fixed number of instructions until the next audio sample.   It can do everything the FV-1 can and more.

I second that.
The FV-1 was really a custom chip at the beginning. It's interesting but has limited processing abilities outside of its intended use (relatively simple DSP.) Its availability even for the short term is unknown.
But for a hobby project, why not, you can sure do a lot of fun stuff with that, and it's fully integrated with very decent specs for audio processing. Anyone who'd like to do some audio (or otherwise low freq) signal processing with a single-chip solution and who doesn't really have any concern for volume production or availability could definitely be interested.

I haven't seen how to get ahold of the development tools though?