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China to Make $125 PCs
Posted by
samzenpus
on Wed Sep 13, 2006 11:15 PM
from the the-peoples-computers dept.
from the the-peoples-computers dept.
TechFreep writes "A Chinese computer company hopes to sell low-cost PCs to schools and government agencies, but allegations of ripped-off processor designs might slow the effort. From the article:
'Chinese-based ZhongKe Menglan Electronics Technology Co. will produce several thousand low-cost PCs to distribute to schools and local governments. The PCs, which will initially sell for $150 to $175, will run on Linux and include 256Mb of RAM, a 40 or 60GB hard drive, and a Godson-2 CPU clocked between 800Mhz and 1Ghz. If initial sales of the product are successful ZhongKe will begin mass production of the units for sale at around 125 US dollars.
However, the Godson-2 CPU included in the PCs has come under scrutiny of late. BLX IC Design Corp., producer of the Godson-2, produced its first working prototype in 2005. The chip clocked at 500Mhz, and BLX at the time claimed the Godson's performance rivaled that of higher-clocked Pentium III CPUs. However, the chip's architecture has gotten attention around the industry for its similarities to the MIPS chip from MIPS Technologies Inc. According to market research group In-Stat, the Godson-2 is about 95 percent compatible with the MIPS R10000, which was introduced in 1995.'"
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MIPS patents? (Score:5, Interesting)
Plasma [opencores.org] implements the MIPS architecture minuses the patented parts. Could the Godson CPU be a variant of this?
Re:MIPS patents? (Score:5, Informative)
I believe you can implemented a near complete MIPS R3000 core with only minor differences and avoid any patent issues (as long as you don't call it a MIPS). Some of the ops on the newer cores are still encumbered and cannot be implemented without paying money to MIPS Technologies [mips.com]. I've worked with a couple of MIPS clones, some by American companies, and there is nothing illegal about them. In fact, it would be far more surprising if the Chinese companies wasted the time creating their own architecture instead of basing it on a proven one.
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Re:MIPS patents? (Score:4, Interesting)
One thing is certain. Microsoft can't pretend that these Linux computers are going to end up running Windows.
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Re:MIPS patents? (Score:4, Informative)
There *IS* Windows NT 3.51 for MIPS...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_NT [wikipedia.org]
We had NEC MIPS servers running it way back when.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Yes, I remember Windows NT for MIPS. That hardly means that you can buy such a beast today. Even if you could buy NT for MIPs what are the chances of it running on something that is 95% compatible?
Besides, what sort of freakshow would rather run Windows NT 3.51 on MIPs over Linux? The most sophisticated piece of software that is likely to run on such a system is notepad.exe.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
There is always someone who will do it and when asked why will reply:
"bacause I can!"
I have a feeling they will anyway (Score:3, Interesting)
The BSA is paid to cry wolf. That's what it does for a living. It's there just to paint a bleak image where poor starving software developpers like MS or Oracle or Autodesk are losing trillions to piracy. It's there to take every single 3D Studio Max copy that some chinese kid downloaded to model a ship or skin for free mod for a $30 game, and present it as $6000 stolen from the poor starving soft
Re:MIPS patents? (Score:5, Informative)
Apparently some of the more recent extensions fall under other patents, but the basic archetecture will be entirely unencumbered after this one expires. And as a Computer Enginering student I can tell you as ISAs go it's far and away the easiest useful one to impliment.
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Re:MIPS patents? (Score:4, Insightful)
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Re:MIPS patents? (Score:5, Informative)
I take it you mean Stanford. I went to UCLA, but many people I've met from different schools in the US have used the same architecture book. I'm talking about computer architecture, not just assembly language. The complexity of the x86 processors is far too great to teach them to undergrads. However, in about a hundred hours of work, one lab partner and I were able to construct a working MIPS-architecture CPU (on a Xilinx FPGA) starting with nothing but gates, flipflops, and other basic elements.
Now, since you know x86 assembly, let me teach you MIPS assembly in one minute:
32 registers, r0-r31. r0 is hardcoded to zero. jal/bal (jump/branch and link) push the PC to r31. otherwise, all registers are equal.
li rD VAL ; load to register rD (destination) immediate value VAL
lw rD rS ; load word at address stored in rS (source) to
add/sub/... rD rA rB ; perform op on registers A and B, store to register D
sw rD rS ; store word at rD to address in rS
You'll be doing a lot of load/stores. The instruction after a branch statement gets executed even if the branch is called. The rest is just details (extend to half-words and bytes at your convenience). There are no index registers, no flags, no predicates, nothing. Congratulations, you are now qualified to program a MIPS processor.
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Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re:MIPS patents? (Score:5, Informative)
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Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Later chips, notable Alpha, don't do this because the number of natural branch delay slots would vary with implementation. To avoid it, you need to add logic to stall the pipeline until the branch result is known. The idea behind MIPS was to build a simple processor without this logic that could be clocked at enormous frequen
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
So what are we upset about? (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't know what's the problem here. It sounds like a great idea to put as many people on the internet as cheaply as possible because more people means more information and more information transfer. Now Wang Chung in the sticks can be just as up to date with government propaganda as Chung King in Shanghai is.
Bruce Lee unavailable for comment.
Re: (Score:2)
Everybody have fun tonight,
Everybody Wang Chung tonight
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
In fact, MIPS is the #1 architecture in several market segments, including:
Cable STB 76%
Satellite STB 30%
DVD Recorders 70%
Cable Modems 95%
Internet Backbone 40%
DSL 52%
WLAN 55%
VoIP 72%
See http://www.mips.com/ [mips.com] for more information on that.
-Bruce Chin
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
So if someone's going to implement one of those instruction sets, it will tend to be MIPS if they're designing their own chip, and either of them if they're buyin
Re:So what are we upset about? (Score:4, Insightful)
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Re: (Score:2)
Patent issues are only likely to be problematic if the Chinese try to sell these machines in the U.S. If they are for the Chinese market there really is very little that the MIPs folks can do, even if they are using MIPs patents.
As much as I would like to be able to get my hands on an inexpensive MIPs-alike Linux box I don't think this is going to be available in my neck of the woods anytime soon.
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Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Actually intellecutal property "owners" don't really have a fundamental expectation of having the same monopoly on ideas in other countries that the do in their own.
China, however, is a WIPO country. If these guys are cheating with the collusion of the Chinese government, the government may be reneging on its commitments; theyh would be getting protection for their inventors without affording equal protection to foreign inventors. On the other
Re:So what are we upset about? (Score:4, Insightful)
You're of course trolling, but your lacking maturity makes this acceptable.
Nevertheless there is nothing more abstract and idiotic to say "I hate this country". What do you hate? Is its rolling hills, its rivers or panda bears? Or might it be that you have a problem with Chinas government and its struggling reformist arm?
Well, you should say so. There are millions of trolls on Slashdot, but why not aspire to be a troll with something to say?
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
What makes you think that? China's economic boom is due to it being beneficial both to China and to its trade partners. After all, if it weren't beneficial to them, why would they engage in the trade?
``they certainly don't need freebies. Besides, isn't it interesting how despite their "internationally competitive" universities, "brilliant minds" and "unlimited resources," they can't even design a relatively simple CPU without ripping
Why is this so hard? (Score:3, Insightful)
So how's that $100 PC coming along? WHAT?? Why do you need those kinds of specs?
Re:Why is this so hard? (Score:5, Insightful)
Not when you want to use OpenOffice and Firefox. I am not sure if they really want to, but todays applications simply require quite a bit more CPU and RAM then yesterdays applications, even for the very same jobs. So unless they also write the low-spec software, they better make sure that they have enough power to run current days applications.
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Besides, lightweight applications already exist. Even better, they are stable. Resurrect them!
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Don't forget the concept of the minimum cost of production.
It doesn't actually cost (much) more to produce a 300 GB HDD than an 8 GB HDD. You have the same basic amount of aluminum, wire, circuit boar
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Yes, they ran Netscape 3.0 and Windows 95 just fine. Similar software today, however, is much better than it used-to be, which is why almost nobody uses that old software on their new computers.
Though, you aren't extremely far off. Something like a 400MHz P2 is fast enough for things like DVD playback, and most office app
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Is the software really better? Compare the system requirements for Word XP to Word 95, and tell me how much extra functionality it really has. People upgraded from Windows 95 because it crashed so often, not because the newer versions had more functionality.
American retailers not much more (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:American retailers not much more (Score:4, Informative)
$45 CPU (AM2 Sempron 2800+, which means upgrade capability later)
$65 M/B (GeForce 6150 w/ integrated video)
$55 2x256 or 1x512MB (or $25 256MB single-stick)
$20 DVD-ROM
$25 Case+PSU
$45 Hard drive
===
$255
More like $300 once you buy a reasonably good case w/ PSU for $50-$75. And it would be expandable to put more memory and a more powerful CPU in it down the road.
You could still probably shave $100 off that price if you go for close-out deals, really cheap motherboards, older CPUs that are only $20ea, 256MB of RAM, and a really cheap case+PSU that will probably catch fire right after the warranty expires.
(The machines I'm building for work are around $500 for parts, but those are dual-core w/ 2GB RAM.)
Parent
It doesn't really matter... (Score:3, Informative)
Cheap computers for all (Score:2, Interesting)
We've all known MIT has been working on the $100 laptop project for some time. http://laptop.media.mit.edu/ [mit.edu]
A 500Mhx chip, etc... It might be inadequate for most programs that arent specifically made to work with it
On a lighter note (Score:4, Funny)
The system will come bundled with lots of open-source software, including the famous Radiant Dragon Pearl 2.0, which is known as the Perl of China, written by Won Ton, who is known as the Larry Wall of China.
Chinese attitude towards Linux (Score:5, Funny)
That's the volume? (Score:2)
They're going to have a hard time making those CPUs cost effective if they're only doing a few thousand. I'm thinking that either something was lost in translation, or the $150 price is some estimate after sales ramp, or it's all calculated in that every wishy-washy government slush fund kind of way.
Anyone care to guess what fab technology they're using?
Why is the processor seen as a ripped-off design? (Score:4, Interesting)
The principal investigator of the Godson program, Hu Weiwu, have some colorful comparions [eetimes.com] to houses and bedrooms when he tries to explain why he means that the Godson-2 processor does not infringe on any patents or intellectual properties.
Re:Why is the processor seen as a ripped-off desig (Score:2)
You're kidding, right? Did you actually look through those comments? There are numerous accusations.
AMD didn't just say one day "We're going to clone Intel chips". They had a contract with Intel, which allowed them to use both the instruction set, and the architecture of Intel's x86 chips. Intel did that because IBM demanded a chip with a second supplier.
AMD went to court
$125 still might be too expensive (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Now try buying a few hundred million used computers at your local surplus store and see if you can still get the same deal. China has a lot of people and buying computers from American second hand stores isn't really a feasible business plan for a company trying to make ground in the Chinese market.
XBox (Score:3, Insightful)
Cost new: $125
So there's already a 125$ pc that can run linux in the mass market here for $125. The specs aren't quite as good as the chinese one, but it is quite a few years old now, and has a well known intel processor and graphics accelerator.
kybMicrosoft-proof (Score:3, Funny)
(OK... I remember there was a Windows NT for MIPS, but I bet it won't run on these. Besides that, who wants Windows NT 3.1 again?)
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
It was that building a computer for relatively cheap (that still functions) is quite possible. I'm not very surprised that china can build $150 laptops... and the government will still make a healthy profit on it probably.
Re: (Score:2)
Umm, apparently it sorta is a word, you shonky shonk!
http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=sh
Re:95% compatibility? (Score:5, Insightful)
All processors have a language they understand, a sequence of bits that have an arbitrary meaning to them. And these are usually published far and wide, so that people can write compilers and operating systems and assemblers for this processor. MIPS in particular is very popular to study because the simple structure makes it possible for teachers to make creating a VHDL or Verilog implementation of a simplified MIPS instruction set into a half-semester project.
In fact I doubt their implementation is anywhere near the same caliber as the Pentium III implementation, even if they claim the same speed. What probably happened is they have access to more modern, smaller fabrication methods so they can cram more transistors into the pipeline. And even soft IP cores in FPGAs can hit 200MHz, so a well designed core could probably hit 500 MHz in an ASIC.
That being said, creating a full super-scalar CPU implementing even 95% of the MIPS 64-4 version of the instruction set in silicon is difficult. I was not familiar with this specification, but a quick search on google reveals that This is a really beefy processor that was probably state of the art in its time. Of course that was over 10 years agos. Is it really so suprising China is only 10 years behind in chip design? After all aren't most of the chip fabrication facilities in east Asia? I'd imagine there would be quite a few people who after a few years decide they want to be on the other end of the process.
Parent
Re:125$ is still unaffordable (Score:4, Insightful)
However, I anticipate that no one will buy it. Computers are too expensive for many Chinese to own personally, but "internet cafes" ("gaming cafe" would be a more accurate name) are plentiful and extremely cheap -- 2 or 3 yuan per hour is typical (that's about 25 - 30 cents US). PC gaming is huge in the PRC (consoles never really caught on), and that's what the vast majority of Chinese use their machines for -- that and chatting, mostly on QQ, which GAIM and friends do not support*.
The result is that most Chinese are routinely exposed to Windows, and worse, they're addicted to a wide variety of Windows-only software. While owning your own machine is certainly a nice perk, the question they will be asking themselves is, do I want to shell out 125 dollars for a machine that won't run any software I want, or do I want to suffer through not having my own machine, and buy a USB memory stick instead, and do all my computing at the local internet cafe?
My guess is that for the vast majority of Chinese, the latter will seem like a much sounder choice. A 125 dollar x86-compatible machine would be one thing, but if all it can run is Linux, the Chinese won't go for it. Linux penetration in China is virtually nil, except maybe in the government, but they're not the types that would buy 125 dollar, 500MHz desktops.
Thankfully, Chinese support is much better in Linux now than it used to be, but there are still no decent free Chinese fonts -- something that, as a Chinese speaker who uses Linux exclusively, I am very aware of. This company probably would think nothing of bundling MS's SimSun and SimHei fonts with their distribution, as they've thought nothing of using a rip off MIPS chip, but that would be copyright infringement and in my mind wrong. I personally use SimSun and SimHei, but I paid the MS tax when I bought my thinkpad with XP pre-installed (in China, no less). The $125 laptop doesn't come with a Windows license.
All in all, it looks like a bust. It's cool, though.
(*There have been a few attempts to port QQ to Linux, but Tencent adds features to the QQ protocol much too quickly to keep up. Lack of support for wanted features would make Linux seem broken, even though the real culprit is a complex, proprietary, binary protocol with built in obsolescence... but hey, they don't know that.)
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