New FPGA manufacturer - German Cologne Chip - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / general

author: daqq
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 06, 2020, 11:23:01 am
content: Found this in a newsletter I receive:https://www.colognechip.com/programmable-logic/gatemate/Good to have another player.

author: AndyC_772
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 06, 2020, 01:18:10 pm
content: Wow, there's a name I've not seen in a long time. I used their ISDN interface parts in a few projects years ago.Must admit, I'm mildly amused to see that they're still selling their ISDN chips as "Recommended for new projects"

author: soFPG
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: July 06, 2020, 09:14:45 pm
content: QuoteDid you take a plane ticket to Shenzhen into account? I don't know if traveling to Shenzhen is reasonable to get some FPGAs.QuoteWhere did you get that price from?

author: Bassman59
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 06, 2020, 11:40:47 pm
content: Quote from: blueskull on July 06, 2020, 01:31:16 pmHere's the real reason for these parts to exist: "Due to manufacturing in Europe, there is no danger of trade restrictions or high taxation."

author: soFPG
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: July 07, 2020, 08:58:39 am
content: QuoteI am not saying it's a fluke but you can't (in my opinion) impose expectations from Shenzhen electronic silicon valley on European products.As far as I can tell, 1.5$ Cyclone IV 7k LUTs on taobao (don't know about 22k LUTs parts) are just a thing because they get scraped off of products which were thrown away (e.g. you are buying used FPGAs which may or may not work).

author: woofy
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: July 07, 2020, 09:59:36 am
content: Have to say, their "datasheet" is less than stella.On a practical note, the lack of 3.3v I/O would put me off. Everything I've done so far (all of two jobs with iCE40's) has needed to interface to 3.3v logic and I don't see that changing. I'm more likely to choose Lattice over Cologne just to avoid level shifting.

author: soFPG
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: July 07, 2020, 10:12:35 am
content: QuoteThis was also the first thing I noticed. Bit of a bummer.

author: Wiljan
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: July 07, 2020, 12:58:27 pm
content: Does 8-LUT (8 inputs with LUT-2 tree) means if fully decode 8 bit in (256 ) to 2 bit out ?So it can have a Sbox 8x8 in 4 LUT's?If so then I think it a very good move

author: BrianHG
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 07, 2020, 01:04:18 pm
content: Quote from: blueskull on July 06, 2020, 01:31:16 pmLOL, they would only catch my interest if their CCGM1A16, 327k LUT and 16 serdes was 10$. The 20k LUT chip needs to be in the 2$ range with an included internal bootprom.

author: filssavi
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: July 07, 2020, 01:27:03 pm
content: If you look at the website, it seems quite clear that they are not really interested to be a competitor to any of the big 4, their purpose in life is just to exist, so that if in the future a random US president bans sale of FPGAs to Europe, the military/ government can have something.The STs and NXPs are not involved because both of their size (it would have been much more costly for the government to pay for their development), and also because they are a much more likely target of complaints from others for unlawful government subsidies (both STM and NXP have sizeable presence in the US) whereas such a small company will generally fly under the radar

author: NorthGuy
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 07, 2020, 02:12:46 pm
content: Quote from: Wiljan on July 07, 2020, 12:58:27 pmThey don't give much information. I guess this is a single 8-input LUT with some quirks. For eaxmple it might be possible to split it into two 7-input LUTs sharing the same inputs. Hence the two outputs. If there were two independent 8-input LUTs inside, it would be silly not to provide an extra input and a mux making it into a 9-input LUT.

author: NorthGuy
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 07, 2020, 02:16:05 pm
content: Quote from: blueskull on July 07, 2020, 02:02:01 pmOne of possible ways is that it didn't pass all the QA tests.

author: rstofer
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 07, 2020, 06:05:36 pm
content: Anybody can make silicon, does the manufacturer have a free, competent, toolchain? That would be my primary concern. As I said, anybody can make silicon.

author: AndyC_772
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 08, 2020, 07:22:16 am
content: Quote from: rstofer on July 07, 2020, 06:05:36 pmThat was my second thought (after "wow, are they still around").I use FPGAs of this kind of size all the time, so a new vendor is genuinely interesting to me provided there are no major costs or technical hurdles in the way. Unfortunately it's quite apparent that they don't have the tool chain support in place - instead they say "design conversion free of charge for GateMateTM customers", and "Typically, a software framework for FPGA design is already installed at the customer side".Well, yes, there is... Quartus, in my case, though I strongly suspect they're thinking of companies who have already paid out for Synplify - which, I presume, doesn't have a condition in the licence explicitly forbidding the user from targeting devices not made by the tool chain vendor.,Clearly the use case for which these parts have been developed is along the lines of:- design FPGA using Intel or Xilinx- discover that, for legal or commercial reasons, continuing to buy parts from those companies is no longer possible or strategically advantageous- convert existing, known working design to use a part from a European supplier-- keep manufacturing productI'd be interested to hear from any engineers who use these devices out of choice, and not as a result of being told that they must use them because <commercial reason>.Maybe I'll give them a call anyway, it could be interesting to see how they respond to "here's my VHDL, tell me how to make it work on your eval board".

author: c64
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: July 09, 2020, 02:54:08 am
content: Quote from: blueskull on July 06, 2020, 01:31:16 pmI've seen very cheap Cyclone IV on taobao, claim to be brand new. Around ¥15 for EP4CE6E22C8N and ¥25 for EP4CE10E22C8N.Do you think they really could be brand new and not rejects?

author: laugensalm
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: July 12, 2020, 09:22:54 am
content: Quote from: AndyC_772 on July 08, 2020, 07:22:16 amI gave this a go (without having a board) just to see what the output netlist would be like, but it appears that some toolchain issues are not entirely solved yet. Then the lockdown kicked in and I got sidetracked.I think they would stir up the community if they presented an open yosys based toolchain flow. Yet, simulation models of their cells aren't in the open, so it's hard to definitely tell for an outsider if some of the promising technology advances would really perform.