
Fund high-resolution 80386 and 80486 series top metal photos - lelf
https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/the-intel-80386-and-80486/
======
acheron
"For most people it started with the 80386 because it allowed running Windows
and helped lead to the rise of the Internet."

whaaat.

A) In a vague, popular sense, the x86 series "started" with the 8088 and the
IBM PC, obviously.

B) The 386 was contemporary with Windows 2.0 which was hardly popular. It was
really used for Windows 3.0 which was a bit better. But the first majorly
popular Windows release was 3.1, which was contemporary with the 486 (though
it could run on 386s too).

C) The number of Windows 3.x users with direct Internet connections was
awfully low. At that point everyone doing consumer-facing networking was on
AOL and similar services. Associating "Windows" and the "rise of the Internet"
gets you to at least Windows 95, which was a Pentium-era product.

I guess that intro statement doesn't really matter to the project, which does
seem kind of cool, but it's also the first thing you read going to the page.

~~~
matthewmcg
Didn't the '386 also inspire the creation of Linux?

~~~
michaelmike
Inspire is not quite the word I would use, I think. The reason so much was
done on the 386 is because Intel finally dropped that god-awful segmented
addressing in favor of a flat memory model. In addition, protected mode became
actually useful and was necessary for a Unix-like OS to be created (where you
have multitasking and protected sections of RAM). Doom was also a killer-app
for the 386.

~~~
vidarh
> was necessary for a Unix-like OS to be created

There are Unix-like OS's on MMU-less architectures. Though of course there are
limitations (like not supporting fork(), only vfork()). But you're right that
it made it a lot more attractive to try to do a proper Unix.

There were even commercial Unix workstations based on MMU-less CPU's. An
example is the Sun 1 workstation, that used an 68000 (Since the first version
- the 68000 - is not fully restartable, various hacks were used on 68000
designs requiring an MMU; I'm not sure what the Sun-1 did, but one example
that was used was running _two_ of them in lockstep, and have the MMU halt the
second one when the first one triggered a page fault, so that it'd be possible
to inspect the CPU state before a bus-error would mess it up. From the 68010
onwards this was unnecessary)

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joezydeco
John McMaster does some amazing stuff. Here's an example of how he took a
section of a chip (Williams Special Chip 1, a blitter device used in a lot of
video games) and reversed it back down to a pair of gates:

[http://uvicrec.blogspot.com/2013/03/williams-special-
chip-1-...](http://uvicrec.blogspot.com/2013/03/williams-special-
chip-1-sc1.html)

~~~
coldpie
In a similar vein, here's a silicon-level reverse engineering of the overflow
bit logic on the 6502. Fascinating stuff.

[http://www.righto.com/2013/01/a-small-part-of-6502-chip-
expl...](http://www.righto.com/2013/01/a-small-part-of-6502-chip-
explained.html)

Side note: these two pages use very similar diagram colors. I wonder if
there's a common source (textbook?) that both authors read that used those
colors.

~~~
joezydeco
I believe those colors are pretty standard nomenclature for the VLSI layout
world.

[http://www.eet.bme.hu/~benedek/Vlsi_Design/Lectures/CMOS_Lay...](http://www.eet.bme.hu/~benedek/Vlsi_Design/Lectures/CMOS_Layout.pdf)
has a color table that seems to match up.

------
VLM
This page fires me up about this project:

[http://www.visual6502.org/wiki/index.php?title=6502_-_simula...](http://www.visual6502.org/wiki/index.php?title=6502_-_simulating_in_real_time_on_an_FPGA)

For either educational purposes or SoC experiments it fires me up to think of
a transistor level FPGA version of a '386, eventually.

This kind of thing is the eventual long term application of this guys project,
aside from abstract art.

(I'm in "submitting too fast" punishment mode, so this edit is a reply to
theatrus2:

Yes you are correct and inspired by the 6502 project, Peter Monta wrote a GPL
utility that converts from transistor netlists to Verilog (or was it VHDL?).
You can probably find it on SF or github. As far as I know its in a working
state, not just vaporware or something.

So its also a cool project in that it inspires interesting software
development.)

~~~
theatrus2
FPGAs cannot model a transistor level design - you would need to replicate the
mask set for that.

------
ctdonath
Intel used to release good-sized posters of those chips (I might have one)
with enough detail to sorta make out transistors. I lamented later chips as
they were so complex the details all blurred into a metallic grey, even at
poster sizes.

~~~
xanderstrike
Why you can't drop 20-50 bucks to get a poster as a reward in this campaign is
beyond me. It seems like such an obvious incentive.

~~~
georgemcbay
Yeah the entire reward structure seem kind of nonsensical to me, basically a
single person has to donate the entire cost behind an imaging, even if the
result is a CC-licensed image; and then you have the upper-tier where someone
can own the copyright over an image; ignoring the fact that if someone pays
for that for some chip on the list and someone else pays for the CC-image of
the same chip the image you own copyright to will be essentially the same as
the one that is placed into the CC, even if he goes through the entire imaging
process multiple times (which seems like a waste of time, but would
technically skirt the licensing clash produced).

Would make a lot more sense, IMO, if it went with a more pooled approach where
smaller donations got, as you mentioned, a poster, perhaps with tiers based on
presentation (just a poster in a tube, framed poster for more money, etc),
dropping things all the way down to say $1-5 to get just a high-res image
suitable to use as a desktop background (I realize that anything released
under the CC from this could be used this way anyway (and you can donate less
than $75); but the point is making an option for people who would like to
throw a few bucks his way because the project is cool, but aren't interested
in dropping $75-400 on it, but would also like to feel like they are getting
"something" out of it, even if just a digital image.

------
codingdave
I think this sounds like a decent project.

But I do wonder about the funding goal. It sounds like the equipment is
already purchased. Asking other people to "recoup" his costs for equipment
that he already owns and uses in his hobbies seems a bit unfair. Likewise,
with vague funding goals like enabling research and funding equipment
upgrades... and the fact that he is matching the price a commercial outfit
would charge to do this... I just get the sense that we aren't being asked to
fund a project as much as the public is being asked to become a paying client
for a professional service.

Not that the service sounds bad - the results would be cool. I'd just like to
know what the actual project costs will be, and have the goal match that.
Anything above and beyond that goal, of course, he should feel free to use to
recoup costs and upgrade.

------
petercooper
Is there a delay on Indiegogo or has a fundraiser that's interesting enough to
hit HN front page for an hour only managed to attract a single $5 pledge in
that time? (Which strikes me as odd given it's getting voted up.)

------
roghummal
It sucks that [http://siliconpr0n.org](http://siliconpr0n.org) has burst into
flames. People would probably be more excited about this if they could check
it out.

Similarly, you could check out the Silicon Zoo
([http://micro.magnet.fsu.edu/creatures/](http://micro.magnet.fsu.edu/creatures/)).
Very cool stuff!

------
terminus
I have been fascinated with chip diagrams like these for a long time:

[http://www.chip-
architect.com/news/2012_04_19_Ivy_Bridges_GP...](http://www.chip-
architect.com/news/2012_04_19_Ivy_Bridges_GPU_2-25_times_Sandys.html)

[http://chip-architect.com/news/2003_09_21_Detailed_Architect...](http://chip-
architect.com/news/2003_09_21_Detailed_Architecture_of_AMDs_64bit_Core.html)

Of course the ones he's planning to photograph are older generation ones but
worthy nonetheless.

Would be interesting to map structures on the metal mask to chip level
structures but that's for later.

------
pera
It wouldn't surprise me to see in the future fundraisings like this for
security purposes.

btw does anyone knows if this is considered reverse engineering by law?

~~~
pjc50
At this stage it's just photography; producing your own ICs from this would
probably run a risk of patent infringement.

There is a sui generis right in IC mask designs, but it's limited to 10 years:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integrated_circuit_layout_desig...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integrated_circuit_layout_design_protection)

~~~
stonemetal
The longest a patent in the US can last is 20 years. According to Wikipedia
the 386 was released in 1985, and '89 for the 486. Therefore any patents
should have expired by now unless they applied for the patents years after
release of the related product.

------
peterhajas
John and I met during our undergrad education at RPI. There was a small but
passionate group of students passionate about IC photography.

------
GotAnyMegadeth
I think there should be some more perks at a wider range of values. There
could be a $20 photo print of one of the photos or something.

------
csbrooks
Some placeholder text got left in: "Remember, keep it concise, yet personal.
Ask yourself: if someone stopped reading here would they be ready to make a
contribution?"

~~~
illumen
Does not give me confidence in the review process at indiegogo.

Edit: ah.

~~~
Dylan16807
While this is indiegogo, Kisckstarter recently removed their review process
entirely.

------
chucknelson
This title is way too vague. I know the domain clues you in a bit, but at
first glance I was hoping for some nostalgic writing about the 386 and 486
architectures.

------
jondtaylor
I noticed this in the blurb:

"Remember, keep it concise, yet personal. Ask yourself: if someone stopped
reading here would they be ready to make a contribution?"

------
phkahler
I always liked the 68000 and wished IBM had chosen it instead. It was a real
32bit chip and I still have an instruction set book for it dated 1979.

------
natch
I think these chip layouts are already copyrighted. Sure photos have their own
copyrights but you are probably infringing by producing and selling the
"copyright" to these. IANAL.

Aside from that, if all you are providing is digital images of them, and the
incremental cost of emailing out an image link to a funder is $0, why be
stingy with what funders get?

To me this looks like nothing more than a "please fund my hobby" campaign,
which I will not support.

~~~
pjc50
See
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integrated_circuit_layout_desig...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integrated_circuit_layout_design_protection)
: masks are not considered creative works and therefore have their own
special, short rules on protection.

The copyright of a photograph of the chip belongs with the person who took the
photograph, as normal.

