Opinion

Jeff Bier’s Impulse Response—A Different Kind of Verification Crisis

It often surprises me how chip vendors will spend a huge amount of money (like, say, 50 million dollars) developing a chip without rigorously verifying that the chip includes all the necessary features for the target applications. For example, awhile back we had a processor vendor ask us to benchmark their new core. As is often the case, the vendor had already done their own evaluation of the chip’s performance, but wanted independent benchmark results to use in their marketing materials.   Read more...

Jeff Bier’s Impulse Response—Avoiding Accidental Stealth Mode

Recently I realized that I hadn’t heard a peep out of a certain embedded processor vendor in quite some time. Usually my colleagues and I at BDTI hear from processor vendors on a regular basis for new product briefings, but it had been almost a year since we’d heard anything from this particular vendor.  The lack of communication made me wonder – what are they up to? Are they still developing new products? I called one of my contacts there to see if I could get a pulse.  It was hard to get a Read more...

Jeff Bier’s Impulse Response—The Getting-the-Box Experience

Whenever I talk to chip and tool vendors about the ease-of-use of their products, they invariably brag about how much time they’ve invested in ensuring a good “out-of-the-box experience.”  What they mean is that, when a customer first starts using one of their products (say, a development kit), the customer finds it easy to get the tool up and running.  This is important, and it’s hard to do well.  We here at BDTI often run into glitches in this area: things like missing files, documentation Read more...

Jeff Bier’s Impulse Response—Massively Parallel Chips Can Lead to Sticky Software

Multicore and massively parallel chips are gaining momentum in embedded applications, and their increasing market acceptance is likely to have some interesting consequences. One of these, I believe, may be that companies that make massively parallel chips and tools—and their customers—will have to grapple with “stickier” software. In general, each multicore processor vendor has a different approach to supporting multicore software development.  For example, Tilera and picoChip both offer Read more...

Jeff Bier’s Impulse Response—Innovation Thrives Even in Tough Economy

The news in our industry certainly is discouraging these days. Every week we read about high-tech companies succumbing to the economic crisis. Big companies are having big layoffs, and small companies are quietly disappearing. Start-ups are unable to secure funding.  But amidst all of this doom and gloom, I have found a source of real encouragement:  I have been struck in recent weeks by the realization that innovation in the electronics industry is not dead.  Far from it. This is Read more...

Jeff Bier’s Impulse Response—Mindless Lawyering***

Not too long ago I received (as I often do) a press release describing a new product from a chip vendor.  I read through the press release, and at the end, I saw this: Confidentiality Notice. This message may contain information that is confidential or otherwise protected from disclosure. If you are not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any use, disclosure, dissemination, distribution, or copying of this message, or any attachments, is strictly prohibited. Umm, hello? Read more...

Jeff Bier’s Impulse Response—Soused Signals

So I’m sitting at the Las Vegas airport last week, on my way home from CES, trying to get some work done on my laptop—but I can’t. Why? Approximately every eighth word is an expletive. It reminded me of how, a few weeks ago on a train, I was treated to a loud, slightly slurred, play-by-play account of a young woman’s recent sexual exploits, as she recounted them to a friend via cell phone. Please, people, I am trying to concentrate here! “Geez,” I think, “Why can’t these people get Read more...

Jeff Bier’s Impulse Response—Don’t Ban Benchmarks

I recently read a license agreement for a suite of software development tools and discovered some interesting fine print: the agreement prohibits licensees from benchmarking the tools. Well, it doesn’t prohibit benchmarking per se, but it prohibits disclosure of any results. Although my company, BDTI, is a benchmarking company (and we benchmark tools as well as processors), we weren’t planning on benchmarking these particular tools. We bought them for use on a software development project Read more...

Jeff Bier’s Impulse Response—We’re Sorry, You’ve Been Disconnected

A few years back I flew to Boston for a conference. Since I have a well-founded fear of driving in Boston, I rented a car with GPS navigation. I drove out of the airport and checked the GPS system, which was functioning perfectly. A short time later, I headed into a tunnel. Suddenly, there were exits coming up fast (inside the tunnel!), and I wasn’t sure which one to take. I looked to my navigation system for guidance, but it was completely clueless. Having lost the GPS signal when I entered Read more...

Jeff Bier’s Impulse Response—System-in-Package Will Bring Variety, Efficiency

Last month I wrote about how my colleagues and I believe that embedded processor vendors will need to become more involved in developing or acquiring proprietary algorithms to stay competitive in the coming decade.  This month, I’ll discuss another long-term trend that we expect to see in processor-based chips: the dramatically expanded use of multi-die packaging (also called “system-in-package”). We all know that integration of more functionality at the silicon die level has some powerful Read more...