Released at the end of June the latest issue of the TOP500 supercomputers, China's great power, the light of the taihu lake quietly off the six successive brothers tianhe 2, becoming the first theoretical performance of 1 billion, the tianhe before 2 keep the advance of the performance of an order of magnitude, new world first shearing section.at calculate. Along with the light of the taihu lake in fact is not only the honor of the first, China's listed on the TOP500 supercomputers quantity for the first time the hegemony of the United States more than the past, super calculate application has realized the breakthrough in thirty years, it is more important is the light of the taihu lake of computer use is domestic processors, is no longer the Intel Xeon processor.
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Domestic processors "instead of" international companies such as Intel, AMD processor has been a national strategy and dream, now in the light of the taihu lake on the computer is really a dream, but at the beginning of the news I can see the comments in a lot of people to the criticism from domestic processors (though most people deny the light of the taihu lake is just to show emotion, negative energy), the problem is also an important factor affecting the development of domestic processors, because of the lack of ecological system, China is developing its own processors also can only be "touch stone across the river", the stone is abroad has developed a processor's instruction set, but this route and can easily be unknown the truth of the onlookers to taunt - using someone else's instruction set, how do you still dare to call the independent property rights?
For this problem, many years ago of the godson CPU architects Dr Hu also explained: "we also can do the world's first CPU, and yes, the key is can't use, users don't need you." Software ecological reality determines the research and development of domestic processors can't starting from 0, in this respect, Japan's 80-90 - s development plan by TRON general OS, CPU, but ultimately failed examples can be said to be had, instead of the C919 large aircraft this international division of labor cooperation mode is easy to succeed.
In terms of research and development of the processor, since our goal is "crossing the river", for the sake of safety, security, feeling for the stones carefully explore is feasible, and China in the research and development on the processor can be said to have touched the stone in the river, from X86 to ARM and MIPS and niche SPARC, Alpha itanium architectures, even almost all domestic tried.
Today, we would like to understand the simple source domestic the processor's instruction set systems and technology. According to open source, the author can find the scheme of typical domestic processors are mainly the godson, ShenWei, signs in the core, ascended, macro core as well as the development of the best smartphone/tablet field haisi, spreadtrum, all volunteers, they use architecture involves X86, ARM, MIPS, Power and SPARC, Alpha, etc.
The godson: pure Chinese core, disappointing commercialization
The godson is not one of the earliest domestic processors, also not be the most successful domestic processors, but when it comes to domestic processors, we first thought would be the godson, it is the highest domestic processors in the exposure, and considering that it is computer research and development of the Chinese academy of sciences, the descent of pure sex are more likely to become the representative of domestic processors.
The Godson group was founded in 2001, but the Godson CPU formally birth date is on August 10, 2002, under the leadership of the computing director member of Wilfred lee, the father of the Godson Dr Hu and his team took out the Godson 1 processor, that year he also wrote the Godson 1 of our article introduces the development course of the Godson, small make up was also seen this article, remember the Godson's code name is "dog left" in Chinese, from Chinese custom of "lai a good feed", but also can see the future of the Godson CPU team although there are looking forward to, but at the time should be a worry for the future development of this project, is the English name of the Godson is very tall - Godson, the son of god!
The godson was born with a reputation for independent research and development, but soon broke the godson instruction set is, in fact, is the result of MIPS, which is about buying it, it makes the godson moment was condemned by, the r&d team also carry the stigma and the stress, Dr Hu also explained why the MIPS instruction set, said "the user need not you" is in front of the root causes, self-built a set of software ecosystem that is impossible for the academic unit of Chinese academy of sciences.
The factor of the second question is that they chose the MIPS instruction set rather than martial arts now ARM instruction set, but the time back in the 2000 s (the godson project research and development of era may earlier), the ARM can have no now so powerful, and MIPS have good foundation in universities, scientific research units, the godson team choose MIPS was understandable.
Anyway, the godson is survived, this project from the initial factor of 1 to the present the godson 3 have developed three generations, each generation is also spawned multiple versions, from a single core and dual to four cores, eight nuclear, from 28 nm to 180 nm process technology, fired from two to four launch, the godson processor architecture, performance, specifications, frequency are in constant progress, the godson 3 b2000 even so-called performance has reached the Intel Ivy Bridge processor, its instruction set is already far beyond the confines of MIPS, joined a lot of the godson teams develop their own instruction, an increase of more than 500 products before custom the godson extension instruction, can be used to implement the binary translation is compatible with other mainstream instruction system, storage access and other I/O efficiency has improved significantly, and is the software and hardware will keep forward compatible.
But the godson isn't without slot points, most of the godson CPU actually live on the achievements of the Chinese academy of sciences to show booth, despite years of everyone to expect about the godson, the Chinese academy of sciences, and even let's jiangsu jiangsu menglan group founded in kelon company to accelerate the commercialization dreams, also introduced a/f/escape fairy fairy fairy desktops, notebooks, and other products, but most of these products are a flash in the pan, performance can not meet the mainstream level, was soon forgotten.
ShenWei/fit: one of the most successful domestic processors, the army's secret weapon
ShenWei and fit although processor route you choose, but the two together, because the two have a military background, behind ShenWei processor is wuxi jiangnan institute of computing technology research and development, the latter is general staff 56 research institute, it has a name is a high performance integrated circuit design center in Shanghai, and tianjin chuang is a subsidiary of national defense science and technology university. In addition, we also reported earlier a company called Phytium company in last year's Hotchips conference in 2015 launched a code-named Mars (Mars) of multi-core processors, the company is guangzhou feiteng, it is said that is also a national defense science and technology university of subordinates, but to develop the fit tianjin feiteng FT the processor is not a unit.
On computer technology research and get back to business, jiangnan is old, but looks a bit on the processor instruction set they chose non-mainstream - DEC Alpha 21264 instruction set, Alpha has uniqueness in technology, DEC was all-powerful in processor market has also, AMD K7 architecture is part of the technology is the result of Alpha architecture, AMD and became CEO Dirk Meyer (Dirk Meyer) from DEC, the father of the last leave Zen architecture Jim Keller had in DEC, Alpha architecture.
Now DEC company would have evaporated, sell them several times, Microsoft also abandoned after Win2000 support, the architecture of Alpha Alpha architecture also already no longer updated, patent is expired, it may be one of the cause of the jiangnan selected Alpha architecture. Jinan 2011 super calculate center deployed the sunway, it used the processor is storing SW1600, 16 core, the data are now believe it is based on patents have expired DEC ALPHA 21164 a EV - 56 architecture.
ShenWei SW26010 processor is the core of 260
Light of the great power of the taihu lake SW26010 processor is developed by jiangnan, although speculation that it is still Alpha instruction set, but with the godson similar subsequent architecture, ShenWei SW26010 architecture, instruction set has been far beyond the previous category, joined the many new instructions. The SW26010 260 core is the nuclear structure, out-of-order execution architecture, frequency of 1.45 GHz, the processor includes four MPE (Management Processing Element) Management unit, four CPE (Computing Processing Element) cell and four MC memory controller unit, including CPE unit and is composed of 8 by 8 array of 64 core, so the total is 260 core (4 + 4 = 260 x64).
Compared with other domestic processors, ShenWei system in performance completely walk in the forefront, in the world are all top, floating point performance of up to 3 tflops SW26010 theory, its performance can be completely and Inel latest Xeon Phi accelerator card. Shortcoming but ShenWei the processor in the memory system, the optical performance of the tai lake to the tianhe 2 three times at the same time, the total memory instead of PB reduced from 1.4 to 1.31 PB, each node USES four road 128 - bit DDR3-2133 memory, bandwidth is 136 gb/s, this point is not like Intel Xeon Phi accelerator card, which integrates itself 16 gb eDRAM cache, bandwidth more than 500 gb/s, and early support DDR4 memory.
Under the fit again, developed by tianjin feiteng FT series processor HPC applications have also, but the fit of FT processing device architecture more cluttered, from the public information the first generation of FT processor compatible with Intel itanium 2 instruction set, the second generation of FT - 64 processor in the Milky Way have been used in the computer, the third generation of FT - 1000 is based on open source UltraSPARC architecture, 8-core 64 threads, computer tianhe 1 there are used on the nodes of the network.
After the FT - 1500 is based on the SPARC architecture, process technology from 65 nm to upgrade to the 40 nm, 16 core 128 threads, in tianhe 2 supercomputers used 4096 FT - 1500 processor as a front-end processor nodes.
Although the latest FT - 1500 - a name to keep up with the similar, but actually has nothing to do, because it architecture into the ARM 64, using the 28 nm process. According to tianjin feiteng GuHong, general manager of FT - 1500 - a series of processor is a 64 - bit general CPU, compatible with the ARM V8 instruction set, adopting international advanced 28 nm process flow sheet, has the characteristics of high performance and low power consumption, the key technology in the domestic leading, which can realize to Intel in the high-end "to" instead of server chips, and is widely applied in the government office and financial and tax industry informatization system.
Whether ShenWei or fit, the two military background of domestic processor unit because of the specific goals, is arguably the most successful domestic processors do - both performance and architecture design is unique, ShenWei processor hardware development, not only in the compiler and the Linux operating system (compared to farce) did the innovation, the light of the taihu lake three the application Gordon bell prize, which is due to the jiangnan about super application efforts.
Sheng macros in the core: blue giant IBM, Power architecture can hold up one day?
General-purpose processor architectures have flowers, Intel when facing the opponent is much larger than now, but now X86 almost unify the whole country, and even fewer can compete with the Intel company, such as IBM have strong Power architecture company also not line, they are simply in joint NVIDIA, taian computer company was founded in 2013 the OpenPower open alliance, other companies can also Power architecture authorized. Founded in 2014, have since pushed China's POWER industry ecology, IBM and many Chinese companies signed the license agreement, sheng in the macro core is one of them.
IBM's Power architecture became domestic processors of hope
Sheng in the macro core was established in 2013, the originator is in jiangsu jiangsu menglan group, jiangsu sheng source, suzhou high-tech venture investment group, jiangsu menglan group we have said before is a subsidiary company of Chinese academy of sciences, which both can be said to be the jiangsu government representatives, therefore sheng macro core Power architecture technology and get the ministry of industry and government in jiangsu and calculate the support of the Chinese academy of sciences, computing and even sent a technical team, if everything can be according to the predetermined introduction, digestion, absorption, sheng in the macro core should be launched in 2019 localization Power processor.
But instead, although will soon launch the CP1 sheng macro core processor, but it just 8 processor IBM Power ma3 jia3, before the company digestion Power technology, they went out of the back pay, Chinese academy of sciences to send technicians to go pay, as the company continued unrest, shareholder changes, researchers also frequent fluctuations, sheng in the count on macro core driving Power architecture localization is hopeless.
In addition, the Power architecture of IBM has important application in domestic Banks and other key industries, and a strong Power processor performance is a good thing, but really didn't so easy, to introduce the digestive Power 8 architecture, for example, it is the core 12 96 threads, 650 was the core area, complexity is much higher than ordinary processors, coupled with the original use is IBM's own 22 nm SOI technology, and SOI process has no contract have (GlobalFoundries, 28 nm node to give up, then inherited the mantle of the IBM), it increases the Power localization of the difficulty of the processor.
Trillion core/sea ray: China can beat Intel, AMD X86 technology?
Mentioned earlier domestic processors, in addition to military background ShenWei, fit, based on the MIPS, SPARC and Power architecture processor development process is over, they face the core issue is the same - software ecosystem is much less than the X86. Since everyone can pay attention to this question, why don't Chinese directly choose X86 architecture? It's a good question, you also don't say, really have to domestic X86 architecture.
Domestic earlier associated with X86 architecture authorization is microelectronics center of Peking University, 2005, AMD reached an agreement with the Chinese government, ministry of science and technology to specify microelectronics center of Peking University to receive AMD Geode - 2 processor technology licensing, microelectronics center of Peking University as the thing also focus on propaganda, said "this is the history of the United States, for the first time to outside the United States authorized X86 compatible chip microprocessor and systems development. The cooperation is also by far the most influential in the field of semiconductor technology cooperation."
AMD for this processor is X86 architecture, thus obtained the X86 and technology of China, but most of the Geode processor is not have heard of it, because it is embedded processors AMD, its first originated in Cyrix corporation MeidaGX platform, then Cyrix this part of the business by the national semiconductor (NS), 2003 AMD Geode and national semiconductor business closed.
X86 AMD to Peking University technology obviously can't be the best, so choosing the embedded architecture to China, but this "charity" can get north pack it well, a lot of people don't remember, I'm afraid there are north mass tzu processor, originally is also do the MIPS architecture, get AMD after authorization, their PKUnity86-3 is compatible X86 processors, but in the end is also go away, and only live in the booth, there is nothing in the news right now.
Say a bit far, return to the topic under discussion. As the X86 architecture is AMD and Intel guy eating, they are usually not may give others the technology licensing, AMD before bought more is that taking the example of the technique to cater to the Chinese market, Chinese companies from the two X86 technology the possibility of a few. But we don't forget to actually is not only the AMD and Intel X86 technology, VIA VIA company also have X86 authorized, their technology comes from Cyrix, the latter is Intel was one of several foreign authorized X86 technology companies.
After the Intel anti-trust case settlement, VIA X86 technology also is one of the legitimation, but VIA a small company, high-performance X86 architecture, can't play them out of the Nano, Nehemiah (Nehemiah), Esther (Esther), Isaiah (Isaiah, VIA general manager Chen wenchi set up, ms wang is a Christian couple, product code is also a religious character), such as the processor and the characteristic, but because of the manufacturing process cannot be compared with Intel, structure and performance are not comparable. Since there is no market, VIA simply sold X86 technology to the mainland of signs in the core company in Shanghai.
Signs in the core of the company is also a background, in 2013 by the Shanghai sasac's alliance with VIA established, registered capital of $200 million, Shanghai paid 80%, which account for 20% of the shares. The mainland cooperation is obviously pay, VIA the technology, because of the signs in the core business scope includes X86, ARM CPU and GPU and CPU chip r&d is VIA the existing, under the state-owned assets supervision and administration commission of Shanghai investment company didn't this technology.
As signs in the core with strong background in the country's nuclear kogi project, according to a report in the public signs in the core of the nuclear kogi subsidies of up to 5.6 billion, also in to apply for follow-up, totalling 7 billion. As for return, mega core boasts independent research and development of ZX - C processor in April 2015, 28 nm process, quad-core processors, frequency of 2.0 GHz, TDP for only 18 w power consumption, and support the encryption algorithm, but the signs in the core CPU is essentially VIA processor of ma3 jia3, from establishment to take out the product, after all, only 2 years or so, so quickly produce a quad-core X86 processors is not easy.
Signs in the core, in addition to Shanghai, another domestic X86 technology is authorized by the tianjin sea ray, it has to start with AMD, Q2 quarter results later this year, AMD, announced that they had reached an agreement with China tianjin sea ray investment company, will the X86 technology to sea ray company, raised $293 million in licensing fees, the two sides will set up a joint venture.
At present about AMD, sea ray X86 license agreement is not clear, but X86 AMD the authorization give Chinese companies are likely to is no longer a low-end, because AMD high-performance server to open the Chinese market, authorization architecture is likely to be high performance technology of Zen, in other words AMD is likely to give the Chinese company's most sophisticated X86 technology, if so, AMD this time really is.
Haisi: true success is the success of the commercial market
Although chose huawei haisi here, but I want to say is actually haisi, spreadtrum, completely and core micro of the development of a group of private companies such as processors, haisi is chosen as the representative, because the sea is one of the outstanding person. Although these companies don't have much background (haisi behind huawei is big company, is an exception), but they just is the most successful commercialization of domestic processors, which is different from other processors described above.
Commercial company to market as the guidance, don't have to carry what domestic pressure, independent property, they invariably chose the most popular system of ARM, ARM architecture is also buy the architecture of A series of authorization, the GPU is to spend money, authorized by the sea, also can develop their own baseband and ISP, DSP chip, the kirin 950 processor is the first architecture A72 core, Mali - T880 GPU and processor, 16 nm TSMC Plus process has the international advanced level.
Conclusion:
Above introduction domestic processors, they generally can be divided into academic writing, set the army, state-owned asset, and private parties, including commercial best obviously is private, domestic manufacturers in mobile phone/tablet SoC processors have rushes out a piece of day, the military sent ascended, ShenWei because specific goals, development actually is also quite successful, ShenWei SW26010 on the nuclear architecture with the level of the world.
Not satisfying to academic and governing parties, the godson was high hopes, but the market is struggling, considering the applications of MIPS instruction set, the godson entered the mainstream market is not possible. Some state-owned capital to participate in domestic processors more disappointing, the launch of the processor often called domestic independent property rights, or independent research and development, but behind is ma3 jia3, many projects are in order to strive for the country's nuclear kogi huge subsidies.
In taking state subsidies this point, of course, is not only Japan, all companies are eager for the cake. Huawei although haisi in the commercial market in the development of good, this deserves our praise, but they also didn't forget nuclear kogi subsidies. We reported the huawei taishan server, the previous data says it USES huawei self-developed CPU architecture, but later huawei pr we clarify - to find this processor is not 16 nuclear but 32 nuclear, based on the male version of the architecture A57 architecture, huawei said the project is the national nuclear kogi plan, not mass production.
I'm not opposed to state subsidies high-tech development, in order to relatively weak, the current domestic research and development of national support and assistance to the processor and memory chip research and development, semiconductor technology and other major technology is very necessary, the question is how to avoid some companies fish in troubled waters, diddle taxpayers' money.
Despite the problems, domestic processors anyway is a to develop the industry, we hope to see a Chinese company in the near future will also be able to create world-class high-performance processor, compete with companies such as Intel, AMD, qualcomm, though not every one will choose domestic processors.
