[ethereal]

This is exactly my take on the Parallella board, and it's the exact reason why I donated to the Kickstarter back in the Fall.

I want to try my hand at writing a real, efficient, many:many message-passing API on top of SHM. It's something I've been interested in for a while (and am doing in an a side project for x86_64). Not because it hasn't been done a thousand times before, but because it's neat.

I want to write a compiler for the Parallella. Not because there aren't compilers already, but because I've never written a compiler that targets a RISC architecture before. I've never written a compiler that respects pipelining.

I want to write a parallelized FFT based on the original paper for the Parallela. I've used various FFT libraries before, but never actually implemented an FFT straight up. Why? Not because it's never been done before, but just because it's an idea that appeals to me. And for practice parallelizing algorithms . . .

I want to write a raytracer for the Parallella. Not because I haven't written a raytracer before, but because I think that I'll be able to do something interesting with a Parallella raytracer that I haven't done before: real-time (ish) raytracing. Not because that hasn't been done before, but because it'd be neat to build.

I want to build a distributed physics engine. Not because there aren't excellent open-source physics engines (Bullet, ODE, etc.) -- but because I find the problem interesting. It's something I've wanted to do for a while, but never got around to. Why? Because it's interesting.

I could go on, but I'll stop here. The Parallella, I think, is a catalyst for a lot of small projects that I've wanted to do for a while. The Parallella is my excuse to spend time on random projects that will never go anywhere beyond a page on my website describing what they are, plus a link to the source code.

And, you know what? That seems perfect to me. That's why I want a Parallella, and that's why I'm eagerly awaiting mine within the next month or three. (Hopefully!)

[astrodust]

Also worth mentioning is the Mojo board, also a Kickstarter project (http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1106670630/mojo-digital-...) which is a simple FPGA system neatly packaged not unlike the Raspberry Pi.

http://embeddedmicro.com/

FPGA allows you to explore a lot of things that just aren't possible in a traditional CPU, no matter how parallel.

[vidarh]

Sounds cool, but worth pointing out that the Parallela is Zynq based, and so comes with a Xilinx FPGA built into the SoC that includes the dual ARM cores. The FPGA provides the "glue" for the Epiphany chip to talk to the CPU, but there's plenty of spare capacity.

The more the merrier, though. I wish I had time to play with FPGA's - I have a Minimig (Amiga reimplementation where the custom chips are all in an FPGA) and I'm on the list for an FPGA Replay (targeting FPGA reimplementation of assorted home computers including the Amiga, and arcade machines in an FPGA).

[iso8859-1]

Nice! Even CC-by-sa licensed!

Do you know how its Spartan-6 XC6SLX9 compares to the Zynq 7010 on the Parallela?

If they are roughly equal, I guess the Parallela is a better deal since it has an ARM too.

Too bad Icarus Verilog can't synthesize at all anymore, Xilinx ISE is very heavy-weight and not FOSS. And they both use that.