New(ish) FPGA Company

I hadn't heard of this company before.  They seem to be making a number of FPGA devices.  Unfortunately all the docs are in Chinese.  Anyone know much about them? 

http://www.anlogic.com/

Google can translate the web pages, but not the data sheets. 

Rick C. 

gnuarm.deletethisbit@gmail.com wrote:
> I hadn't heard of this company before.  They seem to be making a number of
> FPGA devices.  Unfortunately all the docs are in Chinese.  Anyone know
> much about them?
> 
> http://www.anlogic.com/

There's them and another company called AGM, all the parts are fairly cheap:
https://lcsc.com/products/CPLD-FPGA_492.html

Skimming the datasheet diagrams looks like what you'd expect for a low-end
FPGA (Cyclone, Spartan kind of family).  55nm is as small as they go.

Their Tang Dynasty tool looks interesting - as a Quartus user it looks very
familiar (I note their download page has 'quartus' in the page title). 
Might be worth trying sometime.

Theo

On Monday, November 5, 2018 at 6:11:00 AM UTC-5, Theo wrote:
> gnuarm.deletethisbit@gmail.com wrote:
> > I hadn't heard of this company before.  They seem to be making a number of
> > FPGA devices.  Unfortunately all the docs are in Chinese.  Anyone know
> > much about them?
> > 
> > http://www.anlogic.com/
> 
> There's them and another company called AGM, all the parts are fairly cheap:
> https://lcsc.com/products/CPLD-FPGA_492.html
> 
> Skimming the datasheet diagrams looks like what you'd expect for a low-end
> FPGA (Cyclone, Spartan kind of family).  55nm is as small as they go.
> 
> Their Tang Dynasty tool looks interesting - as a Quartus user it looks very
> familiar (I note their download page has 'quartus' in the page title). 
> Might be worth trying sometime.

Some companies are not easy to deal with.  AGM seems to have English information but the one device I can use with FPGA+MCU has a Chinese datasheet with a different name.  I also don't see any tools.  Where did you see that? 

Rick C. 

gnuarm.deletethisbit@gmail.com wrote:
> Some companies are not easy to deal with.  AGM seems to have English
> information but the one device I can use with FPGA+MCU has a Chinese
> datasheet with a different name.  I also don't see any tools.  Where did
> you see that?

http://www.anlogic.com/prod_view.aspx?Id=205&TypeId=205&fid=t3:205:3

I didn't run it, just downloaded the first link and skimmed the PDF inside
the RAR. For all its cloning of Quartus' GUI, it looks fairly simple.

I wouldn't expect any meaningful interaction with them, unless you speak
Chinese.

Theo

On Tuesday, November 6, 2018 at 4:36:44 PM UTC-5, Theo wrote:
> gnuarm.deletethisbit@gmail.com wrote:
> > Some companies are not easy to deal with.  AGM seems to have English
> > information but the one device I can use with FPGA+MCU has a Chinese
> > datasheet with a different name.  I also don't see any tools.  Where did
> > you see that?
> 
> http://www.anlogic.com/prod_view.aspx?Id=205&TypeId=205&fid=t3:205:3
> 
> I didn't run it, just downloaded the first link and skimmed the PDF inside
> the RAR. For all its cloning of Quartus' GUI, it looks fairly simple.
> 
> I wouldn't expect any meaningful interaction with them, unless you speak
> Chinese.

Yeah, all the tool info seems to be in Chinese.  If they were cloning the iCE40 devices there would be open source tools potentially.  

Rick C.  

On Tuesday, November 6, 2018 at 8:36:48 PM UTC-5, gnuarm.del...@gmail.com wrote:
> On Tuesday, November 6, 2018 at 4:36:44 PM UTC-5, Theo wrote:
> > gnuarm.deletethisbit@gmail.com wrote:
> > > Some companies are not easy to deal with.  AGM seems to have English
> > > information but the one device I can use with FPGA+MCU has a Chinese
> > > datasheet with a different name.  I also don't see any tools.  Where did
> > > you see that?
> > 
> > http://www.anlogic.com/prod_view.aspx?Id=205&TypeId=205&fid=t3:205:3
> > 
> > I didn't run it, just downloaded the first link and skimmed the PDF inside
> > the RAR. For all its cloning of Quartus' GUI, it looks fairly simple.
> > 
> > I wouldn't expect any meaningful interaction with them, unless you speak
> > Chinese.
> 
> Yeah, all the tool info seems to be in Chinese.  If they were cloning the iCE40 devices there would be open source tools potentially.  

I always wanted to learn a foreign language.  Maybe now is the time. 

Rick C. 

On Sunday, November 4, 2018 at 8:01:22 PM UTC-5, gnuarm.del...@gmail.com wrote:
> I hadn't heard of this company before.  They seem to be making a number of FPGA devices.  Unfortunately all the docs are in Chinese.  Anyone know much about them? 
> 
> http://www.anlogic.com/
> 
> Google can translate the web pages, but not the data sheets. 
> 
> Rick C.

I'm a bit surprised at the lack of response...  hello...  Is this mike on? 

I would have thought FPGA people might get excited about a 16 kLUT FPGA with an embedded MCU for under $10.  I am... sort of.  But I haven't started my Chinese lessons yet. 

Rick C. 

On Saturday, November 10, 2018 at 11:39:55 AM UTC-6, gnuarm.del...@gmail.com wrote:
> On Sunday, November 4, 2018 at 8:01:22 PM UTC-5, gnuarm.del...@gmail.com wrote:
> > I hadn't heard of this company before.  They seem to be making a number of FPGA devices.  Unfortunately all the docs are in Chinese.  Anyone know much about them? 
> > 
> > http://www.anlogic.com/
> > 
> > Google can translate the web pages, but not the data sheets. 
> > 
> > Rick C.
> 
> I'm a bit surprised at the lack of response...  hello...  Is this mike on? 
> 
> I would have thought FPGA people might get excited about a 16 kLUT FPGA with an embedded MCU for under $10.  I am... sort of.  But I haven't started my Chinese lessons yet. 
> 
> Rick C.

I'd get interested if they have timing driven place & route.
The silicon technology isn't that difficult.

Jim Brakefield

On Saturday, November 10, 2018 at 6:12:16 PM UTC-6, jim.bra...@ieee.org wrote:
> On Saturday, November 10, 2018 at 11:39:55 AM UTC-6, gnuarm.del...@gmail.com wrote:
> > On Sunday, November 4, 2018 at 8:01:22 PM UTC-5, gnuarm.del...@gmail.com wrote:
> > > I hadn't heard of this company before.  They seem to be making a number of FPGA devices.  Unfortunately all the docs are in Chinese.  Anyone know much about them? 
> > > 
> > > http://www.anlogic.com/
> > > 
> > > Google can translate the web pages, but not the data sheets. 
> > > 
> > > Rick C.
> > 
> > I'm a bit surprised at the lack of response...  hello...  Is this mike on? 
> > 
> > I would have thought FPGA people might get excited about a 16 kLUT FPGA with an embedded MCU for under $10.  I am... sort of.  But I haven't started my Chinese lessons yet. 
> > 
> > Rick C.
> 
> I'd get interested if they have timing driven place & route.
> The silicon technology isn't that difficult.

I'm not worried about them being better than the other FPGA companies.  I'm pretty interested in the parts being pretty inexpensive and available in easier to use packages.  I'm not sure what it will take to get contract assembly houses to buy direct from Asian suppliers.  Since they are on the hook for building working boards they can be a bit funny who they buy parts from. 

Rick C. 

On Saturday, November 10, 2018 at 7:39:55 PM UTC+2, gnuarm.del...@gmail.com wrote:
> On Sunday, November 4, 2018 at 8:01:22 PM UTC-5, gnuarm.del...@gmail.com wrote:
> > I hadn't heard of this company before.  They seem to be making a number of FPGA devices.  Unfortunately all the docs are in Chinese.  Anyone know much about them? 
> > 
> > http://www.anlogic.com/
> > 
> > Google can translate the web pages, but not the data sheets. 
> > 
> > Rick C.
> 
> I'm a bit surprised at the lack of response...  hello...  Is this mike on? 
> 
> I would have thought FPGA people might get excited about a 16 kLUT FPGA with an embedded MCU for under $10.  I am... sort of.  But I haven't started my Chinese lessons yet. 
> 
> Rick C.

No, I am not excited. 10CL016 is 17 USD on digikey in quantity of 1.
Which probably means pretty close to 10 USD in quantity of few 1000s. And if the quantity is lower than few 1000s then I probably don't care if it's 10 UDS or 17.
10CL016 comes with datasheet that I can read and with development tools that I can trust.

If you propose me "40 kLUT for 5 USD" then there is a chance that I can start to get excited.

BTW, as far as variable cost goes "40 kLUT for 5 USD" is pretty easy at 28nm or better. The problem here is how do you recover NRE. One have to sell more than 10M units. Probably much more.