Electronics > Projects, Designs, and Technical Stuff
Oscilloscope ASIC Kickstarter instead of Open scope.
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nctnico:

--- Quote from: excitedbox on January 11, 2020, 10:51:37 pm ---That will just drive people away.

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Off-topic rants by the OP also do that. If you want a thread to to stay on-topic then stay on-topic yourself. Lead by example.
David Hess:

--- Quote from: excitedbox on January 11, 2020, 12:07:26 am ---David Hess- Keysight, Tektronix, Rigol, all have their own ASICs. Did you even read the first post? You picked single pieces of information to base your argument on and didn´t look at the whole picture.
--- End quote ---

You not only have to compete with existing designs which have the advantage of economy of scale allowing a fully custom ASIC but existing programmable logic based designs which did *not* justify an ASIC.  Based on HP and Tektronix using the same fully custom ICs for such long periods of time that it held back features and performance, I think ASICs were marginal even for them except at the high end.

Is there something that you cannot accomplish economically with an FPGA now?  I have looked into this problem in detail before and with a small or perhaps no loss of performance, I am sure that an economical FPGA based design is feasible now if the hardware and software is partitioned correctly.  Most of the flaws in commercial designs seem to be on the software side.
excitedbox:
Xfab has open source ip on this site and also includes a handy little cost calculator that shows just how cheap it is for raw dies. Obviously you gotta package them too but it is pretty cool looking at all the microscope pictures of the transistor stacks.
https://www.xfab.com


You are right that software is a major expense because salaries stack up quickly. That is why the 2 prong approach with a open source scope framework. The only reason those Chinese Logic Analyzers are so cheap is because they stole the software fro that other project.

Right now a lot of projects are not viable because of the high cost for fast ADCs and DSPs etc. Each chip is not just associated with a manufacturing cost right now but also with a profit margin, marketing budget, and operating expenses for the manufacturer and that reduces the profit you can make on your product.

You do bring up some valid points. Rigols 7 in 1 scope would probably not have been possible without a custom asic so it allows them to add features that wouldn´t exist otherwise. But that is also a plus for competition. As an opensource project we don´t have to compete with anything since it is not about making money. Part of the "profit" is helping people access equipment they couldn´t otherwise. Right now a 2ch1Gsps ADC costs over $400 that is not a cost many consumer products can carry. If that chip comes down in price we might see a whole host of new products on the market.

An FPGA is just not an efficient way of doing things. Yes it is great when you need to customize a circuit but a chip is already 70% interconnects. When you add all that switching it becomes even more.even Intel eAsics which have a bunch of blocks and only the top layer is customize robs you of one out of 6 layers. With each layer you build the yield drops substantially too driving costs up more.


We need to focus on finding out what is on one of these custom Asics besides a DSP and ADC and what modules manufacturers are currently implementing on the FPGA. Only then can we see if it is worth it and what it would take to make it reality. Everything else is useless right now. None of these arguments are real without having real world facts.
tautech:

--- Quote from: excitedbox on January 12, 2020, 06:35:46 am ---Right now a 2ch1Gsps ADC costs over $400 that is not a cost many consumer products can carry.

--- End quote ---
:-//
How can that be when something just like that is the basis for a SDS2000X-E series DSO retailing @ $620 ?
EEVblog:

--- Quote from: excitedbox on January 09, 2020, 05:59:28 am ---They are holding back innovation by keeping the test equipment out of the reach of students, researchers, small companies, and individuals. We need to put a stop to it.

--- End quote ---

Wow, are you serious?
Do you have any clue how much scope you can buy for under $400 these days?
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