Godson
Encyclopedia
Loongson is a family of general-purpose MIPS
-compatible CPU
s developed at the Institute of Computing Technology (ICT), Chinese Academy of Sciences
(CAS) in the People's Republic of China
. The chief architect is Professor Hu Weiwu.
Loongson is the result of a public-private partnership
. BLX IC Design Corporation was founded in 2002 by ICT and Jiangsu Zhongyi Group. Based in Beijing
, BLX focuses on designing the 32- and 64-bit Loongson general-purpose and embedded processors, together with developing software tools and reference platforms.
STMicroelectronics
fabricates and markets Loongson chips for BLX, which is fabless.
China uses Linux with its Loongson processor family to achieve technology independence.
-compatible, but the internal microarchitecture
is independently developed by ICT
. Early implementations of the family lacked four instructions patented by MIPS Technologies
to avoid legal issues.
In 2007, a deal was reached by MIPS Technologies and ICT. STMicroelectronics bought a MIPS license for Loongson, and thus the processor can be promoted as MIPS-based or MIPS-compatible instead of MIPS-like.
In June 2009, ICT licenced the MIPS32 and MIPS64 architectures directly from MIPS Technologies.
In August 2011, Loongson Technology Corp. Ltd. licensed the MIPS32 and MIPS64 architectures from MIPS Technologies, Inc. for continued development of MIPS-based Loongson CPU cores.
. The Godson 2F, released to market in early 2008, ran at 1.2 GHz
.
, with 4 CPU cores (~15W) first and 8 cores later (40W). In April 2010, Loongson 3A was released with DDR2/3 DRAM support.
The Godson-3B has exceptional energy efficiency in terms of performance per watt
-- executing 128 GFLOPS using 40 watts.
area. The new instructions help QEMU
translate x86 instructions by lowering the overhead of executing x86/CISC
-style instructions in the MIPS pipeline. With added improvements in QEMU from ICT, Loongson-3 achieves an average of 70% the performance of executing native binaries when running x86 binaries from nine benchmarks.
, Advanced Micro Devices
or VIA Technologies
, Loongson does not support the x86 instruction set. The processor's main operating system
is GNU
/Linux
, while in theory any OS with MIPS support should also work. For example, Windows CE
was ported to a Loongson-based system with minimal effort. In 2010, Lemote ported an Android distribution to the Loongson platform.
Many operating systems work on Loongson.
GNU/Linux distributions:
BSDs:
Windows:
(GCC) is the main compiler for software development on the Loongson platform. To target code for the Loongson 2F processor, GCC 4.4 or later should be used with the flags
ICT also ported Open64
, an advanced optimizing compiler, to the Loongson II platform.
applications (including OpenOffice.org
, Mozilla Firefox
, Pidgin
, and MPlayer
) and applications written for the Java platform are supported. For .NET
applications, an unofficial port of the Mono
Common Language Runtime
is available online.
In March 2006, a €
100 Loongson II computer design called Longmeng (Dragon Dream) was announced by Lemote.
In June 2006 at Computex'2006, YellowSheepRiver announced the Municator YSR-639, a small form factor
computer based on the 400 MHz Loongson 2.
Currently, Loongson boxes that come with a 667 MHz Godson 2E processor or a 800 MHz Godson 2F processor are sold in China at CNY1599 (~US$200) or CNY 1800 respectively without monitor, mouse, or keyboard.
As of July 2008 two manufacturers have announced Loongson 2F products for sale outside China
.
the new 8.9" netbook from the Chinese manufacturer Lemote that replaced mengloong, Yeeloong (Portable Dragon), running Debian GNU/Linux, is available in Europe from the Dutch company Tekmote Electronics.
has been developed and is expected to launch in August 2011. With a similar design to the MacBook Pro
from Apple Inc., it will carry a Linux
operating system by default.
In September 2011, Lemote announced the Yeeloong-8133 13.3" laptop featuring 900MHz, quad-core Loongson-3A/2GQ CPU.
with performance 1 teraFLOPS
of peak performance, and about 350 GFLOPS measured by linpack
in Hefei
, designated as KD-50-I. This supercomputer was designed by a joint team led by Professor Chen Guoliang (陈国良) at the computer science technology department of the University of Science and Technology of China
and ICT (the secondary contractor). KD-50-I is the first Chinese built supercomputer to utilize domestic Chinese CPUs, with a total of more than 330 Loongson-2F CPUs, and nodes are interconnected by ethernet. The size of the computer was roughly equivalent to a household refrigerator and the cost was less than RMB
800,000 (approximately USD $120,000, EURO €80.000).
On 20 April 2010, USTC announced Loongson 3A based KD-60-1. The new supercomputer is a cluster of standard blade server
s with a total of over 80 quad-core Loongson processors, providing theoretical peak performance of 1 TFLOPS and reduces power consumption by 56% compared to the KD-50-I system that has similar performance.
On 25 June 2008, Hu Weiwu (chief designer of Loongson processors) gave a keynote speech at ISCA
2008, held in Beijing. The topic of the speech was "Research and Development of Godson processors".
2010 January, Jiangsu
province plans to buy 1.5 million Loongson PCs.
On 24 August 2010, Hu Weiwu presented a paper on Godson-3C at the Hot Chips 22 conference, held in Stanford, USA. The title of the paper was "GS464V: A High-Performance Low-Power XPU with 512-Bit Vector Extension".
On 21 February 2011, Hu Weiwu presented a paper on Godson at ISSCC 2011, held in San Francisco, USA. The title of the paper was "Godson-3B: a 1GHz 40W 8-core 128GFlopS processor in 65nm CMOS".
On 19 August 2011, Dongrui Fan presented a paper on Godson-T at Hot Chips 23 conference at Stanford University (USA), titled "High-Efficient Architecture of Godson-T Many-Core Processor".
MIPS architecture
MIPS is a reduced instruction set computer instruction set architecture developed by MIPS Technologies . The early MIPS architectures were 32-bit, and later versions were 64-bit...
-compatible CPU
Central processing unit
The central processing unit is the portion of a computer system that carries out the instructions of a computer program, to perform the basic arithmetical, logical, and input/output operations of the system. The CPU plays a role somewhat analogous to the brain in the computer. The term has been in...
s developed at the Institute of Computing Technology (ICT), Chinese Academy of Sciences
Chinese Academy of Sciences
The Chinese Academy of Sciences , formerly known as Academia Sinica, is the national academy for the natural sciences of the People's Republic of China. It is an institution of the State Council of China. It is headquartered in Beijing, with institutes all over the People's Republic of China...
(CAS) in the People's Republic of China
People's Republic of China
China , officially the People's Republic of China , is the most populous country in the world, with over 1.3 billion citizens. Located in East Asia, the country covers approximately 9.6 million square kilometres...
. The chief architect is Professor Hu Weiwu.
Loongson is the result of a public-private partnership
Public-private partnership
Public–private partnership describes a government service or private business venture which is funded and operated through a partnership of government and one or more private sector companies...
. BLX IC Design Corporation was founded in 2002 by ICT and Jiangsu Zhongyi Group. Based in Beijing
Beijing
Beijing , also known as Peking , is the capital of the People's Republic of China and one of the most populous cities in the world, with a population of 19,612,368 as of 2010. The city is the country's political, cultural, and educational center, and home to the headquarters for most of China's...
, BLX focuses on designing the 32- and 64-bit Loongson general-purpose and embedded processors, together with developing software tools and reference platforms.
STMicroelectronics
STMicroelectronics
STMicroelectronics is an Italian-French electronics and semiconductor manufacturer headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland.While STMicroelectronics corporate headquarters and the headquarters for EMEA region are based in Geneva, the holding company, STMicroelectronics N.V. is registered in Amsterdam,...
fabricates and markets Loongson chips for BLX, which is fabless.
China uses Linux with its Loongson processor family to achieve technology independence.
MIPS patent issues
Loongson's instruction set is MIPSMIPS architecture
MIPS is a reduced instruction set computer instruction set architecture developed by MIPS Technologies . The early MIPS architectures were 32-bit, and later versions were 64-bit...
-compatible, but the internal microarchitecture
Microarchitecture
In computer engineering, microarchitecture , also called computer organization, is the way a given instruction set architecture is implemented on a processor. A given ISA may be implemented with different microarchitectures. Implementations might vary due to different goals of a given design or...
is independently developed by ICT
Institute of Computing Technology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences
The Institute of Computing Technology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences was founded in 1956. It is the first academic establishment to specialize in comprehensive research on computer science and technology in China...
. Early implementations of the family lacked four instructions patented by MIPS Technologies
MIPS Technologies
MIPS Technologies, Inc. , formerly MIPS Computer Systems, Inc., is most widely known for developing the MIPS architecture and a series of pioneering RISC chips. MIPS provides processor architectures and cores for digital home, networking and mobile applications.MIPS Computer Systems Inc. was...
to avoid legal issues.
In 2007, a deal was reached by MIPS Technologies and ICT. STMicroelectronics bought a MIPS license for Loongson, and thus the processor can be promoted as MIPS-based or MIPS-compatible instead of MIPS-like.
In June 2009, ICT licenced the MIPS32 and MIPS64 architectures directly from MIPS Technologies.
In August 2011, Loongson Technology Corp. Ltd. licensed the MIPS32 and MIPS64 architectures from MIPS Technologies, Inc. for continued development of MIPS-based Loongson CPU cores.
Loongson 1
The first revision of the Loongson architecture, the Loongson1 (Godson-232 core) is a pure 32-bit CPU running at a clock speed of 266 MHz. It is fabricated with 0.18 micron CMOS process, has 8 kB of data cache, 8 kB of instruction cache and a 64-bit floating-point unit, capable of 200 double-precision MFLOPS. Its main focus is on embedded designs such as POS, where 64-bit ability and high speed are unneeded.Loongson 2
The Loongson 2 adds 64-bit ability to the Loongson architecture. Initially running at 500 MHz, later revisions to Godson 2E were produced that run up to 1 GHzGHZ
GHZ or GHz may refer to:# Gigahertz .# Greenberger-Horne-Zeilinger state — a quantum entanglement of three particles.# Galactic Habitable Zone — the region of a galaxy that is favorable to the formation of life....
. The Godson 2F, released to market in early 2008, ran at 1.2 GHz
GHZ
GHZ or GHz may refer to:# Gigahertz .# Greenberger-Horne-Zeilinger state — a quantum entanglement of three particles.# Galactic Habitable Zone — the region of a galaxy that is favorable to the formation of life....
.
Loongson 2F
- 4-way superscalarSuperscalarA superscalar CPU architecture implements a form of parallelism called instruction level parallelism within a single processor. It therefore allows faster CPU throughput than would otherwise be possible at a given clock rate...
, out-of-order executionOut-of-order executionIn computer engineering, out-of-order execution is a paradigm used in most high-performance microprocessors to make use of instruction cycles that would otherwise be wasted by a certain type of costly delay...
, 64-bit64-bit64-bit is a word size that defines certain classes of computer architecture, buses, memory and CPUs, and by extension the software that runs on them. 64-bit CPUs have existed in supercomputers since the 1970s and in RISC-based workstations and servers since the early 1990s...
MIPS architectureMIPS architectureMIPS is a reduced instruction set computer instruction set architecture developed by MIPS Technologies . The early MIPS architectures were 32-bit, and later versions were 64-bit...
processor core - Little-endianEndiannessIn computing, the term endian or endianness refers to the ordering of individually addressable sub-components within the representation of a larger data item as stored in external memory . Each sub-component in the representation has a unique degree of significance, like the place value of digits...
MIPS III-compatible ISAInstruction setAn instruction set, or instruction set architecture , is the part of the computer architecture related to programming, including the native data types, instructions, registers, addressing modes, memory architecture, interrupt and exception handling, and external I/O... - 5 execution unitExecution unitIn computer engineering, an execution unit is a part of a CPU that performs the operations and calculations called for by the Branch Unit, which receives data from the CPU...
s: 2 ALUArithmetic logic unitIn computing, an arithmetic logic unit is a digital circuit that performs arithmetic and logical operations.The ALU is a fundamental building block of the central processing unit of a computer, and even the simplest microprocessors contain one for purposes such as maintaining timers...
s, 2 FPUFloating point unitA floating-point unit is a part of a computer system specially designed to carry out operations on floating point numbers. Typical operations are addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, and square root...
s, and 1 address generation unit (AGU) - SIMDSIMDSingle instruction, multiple data , is a class of parallel computers in Flynn's taxonomy. It describes computers with multiple processing elements that perform the same operation on multiple data simultaneously...
unit is integrated with one of the 2 FPUFloating point unitA floating-point unit is a part of a computer system specially designed to carry out operations on floating point numbers. Typical operations are addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, and square root...
s - Separate 64/64 KBKilobyteThe kilobyte is a multiple of the unit byte for digital information. Although the prefix kilo- means 1000, the term kilobyte and symbol KB have historically been used to refer to either 1024 bytes or 1000 bytes, dependent upon context, in the fields of computer science and information...
instruction and data L1 cachesCPU cacheA CPU cache is a cache used by the central processing unit of a computer to reduce the average time to access memory. The cache is a smaller, faster memory which stores copies of the data from the most frequently used main memory locations... - On-chip 512 KB 4-way set-associative L2 cacheCPU cacheA CPU cache is a cache used by the central processing unit of a computer to reduce the average time to access memory. The cache is a smaller, faster memory which stores copies of the data from the most frequently used main memory locations...
- Integrated DDR2DDR2 SDRAMDDR2 SDRAM is a double data rate synchronous dynamic random-access memory interface. It supersedes the original DDR SDRAM specification and has itself been superseded by DDR3 SDRAM...
memory controller - Integrated very simple video accelerator
- Software-controlled dynamic power management
- Max 4 W at 1 GHz
Godson-2G
- 1.0GHz, 65nm CMOS, 3W
- 100M transistors, area 60mm^2
- Single GS464 core
- 64-bit MIPS64 Compatible
- HW support X86 binary translation
- Four-issue, OOO
- 64KB+64KB L1 (four-way)
- 1MB L2 cache
- On-chip DDR2/3 controller.
- 16-bit HT
- PCI/PCIX, LPC, GPIO, etc.
Godson-2H
- 1GHz, 65nm
- Single GS464V core (HD media decoding)
- 512KB L2 cache
- 3D low-power GPU
- DDR2/3 memory controller
- PCIE 2.0 controller
- SATA, USB, GMAC controller
- LPC, SPI, UART, etc.
Loongson 3
The 65 nm Loongson 3 (Godson-3) is able to run at a clock speed near 1 GHzGHZ
GHZ or GHz may refer to:# Gigahertz .# Greenberger-Horne-Zeilinger state — a quantum entanglement of three particles.# Galactic Habitable Zone — the region of a galaxy that is favorable to the formation of life....
, with 4 CPU cores (~15W) first and 8 cores later (40W). In April 2010, Loongson 3A was released with DDR2/3 DRAM support.
Loongson 3B
The updated 8-core 65nm Loongson 3B processor runs at 1.05 GHz, with a peak performance of 128 GFLOPS double-precision, or 256 GFLOPS single-precision. This is accomplished by having two 256-bit vector processing units in each core. They produce a peak performance of 8 double-precision floating-point fused Multiply-Add results per cycle, or 16 GFLOPS per core operating at 1 GHz.The Godson-3B has exceptional energy efficiency in terms of performance per watt
Performance per watt
In computing, performance per watt is a measure of the energy efficiency of a particular computer architecture or computer hardware. Literally, it measures the rate of computation that can be delivered by a computer for every watt of power consumed....
-- executing 128 GFLOPS using 40 watts.
Hardware-assisted x86 emulation
Loongson 3 adds over 200 new instructions to speed up x86 instruction execution at a cost of 5% of the total dieDie (integrated circuit)
A die in the context of integrated circuits is a small block of semiconducting material, on which a given functional circuit is fabricated.Typically, integrated circuits are produced in large batches on a single wafer of electronic-grade silicon or other semiconductor through processes such as...
area. The new instructions help QEMU
QEMU
QEMU is a processor emulator that relies on dynamic binary translation to achieve a reasonable speed while being easy to port on new host CPU architectures....
translate x86 instructions by lowering the overhead of executing x86/CISC
Complex instruction set computer
A complex instruction set computer , is a computer where single instructions can execute several low-level operations and/or are capable of multi-step operations or addressing modes within single instructions...
-style instructions in the MIPS pipeline. With added improvements in QEMU from ICT, Loongson-3 achieves an average of 70% the performance of executing native binaries when running x86 binaries from nine benchmarks.
Supported software
Unlike processors from IntelIntel Corporation
Intel Corporation is an American multinational semiconductor chip maker corporation headquartered in Santa Clara, California, United States and the world's largest semiconductor chip maker, based on revenue. It is the inventor of the x86 series of microprocessors, the processors found in most...
, Advanced Micro Devices
Advanced Micro Devices
Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. or AMD is an American multinational semiconductor company based in Sunnyvale, California, that develops computer processors and related technologies for commercial and consumer markets...
or VIA Technologies
VIA Technologies
VIA Technologies is a Taiwanese manufacturer of integrated circuits, mainly motherboard chipsets, CPUs, and memory, and is part of the Formosa Plastics Group. It is the world's largest independent manufacturer of motherboard chipsets...
, Loongson does not support the x86 instruction set. The processor's main operating system
Operating system
An operating system is a set of programs that manage computer hardware resources and provide common services for application software. The operating system is the most important type of system software in a computer system...
is GNU
GNU
GNU is a Unix-like computer operating system developed by the GNU project, ultimately aiming to be a "complete Unix-compatible software system"...
/Linux
Linux
Linux is a Unix-like computer operating system assembled under the model of free and open source software development and distribution. The defining component of any Linux system is the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released October 5, 1991 by Linus Torvalds...
, while in theory any OS with MIPS support should also work. For example, Windows CE
Windows CE
Microsoft Windows CE is an operating system developed by Microsoft for embedded systems. Windows CE is a distinct operating system and kernel, rather than a trimmed-down version of desktop Windows...
was ported to a Loongson-based system with minimal effort. In 2010, Lemote ported an Android distribution to the Loongson platform.
Many operating systems work on Loongson.
GNU/Linux distributions:
- DebianDebianDebian is a computer operating system composed of software packages released as free and open source software primarily under the GNU General Public License along with other free software licenses. Debian GNU/Linux, which includes the GNU OS tools and Linux kernel, is a popular and influential...
, specifically their mipsel port - Gentoo LinuxGentoo LinuxGentoo Linux is a computer operating system built on top of the Linux kernel and based on the Portage package management system. It is distributed as free and open source software. Unlike a conventional software distribution, the user compiles the source code locally according to their chosen...
, specifically their mips port - Red Flag LinuxRed Flag LinuxRed Flag Linux is a Chinese Linux distribution developed by Red Flag Software. Red Flag's logo is Tux carrying a prominent red flag.The current executive president of Red Flag Software is Jia Dong .-Description:...
- Mandriva LinuxMandriva LinuxMandriva Linux is a Linux distribution distributed by Mandriva. It uses the RPM Package Manager...
, since http://www.boursorama.com/forum/message.phtml?file=365044478&pageForum= 1 September 2007 - gNewSenseGNewSensegNewSense is a Linux distribution based on Ubuntu. Its goal is to maintain the user-friendliness of Ubuntu, but with all non FSF approved software and binary blobs removed. The Free Software Foundation considers gNewSense to be a Linux distribution composed entirely of free software.gNewSense takes...
, work in progress - CLFSLinux From ScratchLinux From Scratch is a type of a Linux installation and the name of a book written by Gerard Beekmans among others. The book gives readers instructions on how to build a Linux system from source...
, MIPS 32/64-bit, Multilib - UTUTOUtutoUtuto GNU/Linux is a GNU/Linux operating system consisting entirely of free software. The name makes reference to a gecko known by this name from northern Argentina. It is compiled using Gentoo Linux "ebuilds" and "emerge" software. All documentation is in Spanish.Ututo was the first fully free...
, work in progress - EVEREST Linux
- FedoraFedora (operating system)Fedora is a RPM-based, general purpose collection of software, including an operating system based on the Linux kernel, developed by the community-supported Fedora Project and sponsored by Red Hat...
, work in progress - ArchLinux, Sources
BSDs:
- NetBSDNetBSDNetBSD is a freely available open source version of the Berkeley Software Distribution Unix operating system. It was the second open source BSD descendant to be formally released, after 386BSD, and continues to be actively developed. The NetBSD project is primarily focused on high quality design,...
, evbmips/gdium - OpenBSDOpenBSDOpenBSD is a Unix-like computer operating system descended from Berkeley Software Distribution , a Unix derivative developed at the University of California, Berkeley. It was forked from NetBSD by project leader Theo de Raadt in late 1995...
, OpenBSD/loongson - FreeBSDFreeBSDFreeBSD is a free Unix-like operating system descended from AT&T UNIX via BSD UNIX. Although for legal reasons FreeBSD cannot be called “UNIX”, as the direct descendant of BSD UNIX , FreeBSD’s internals and system APIs are UNIX-compliant...
, kfreebsd-yeeloong
Windows:
- Windows CEWindows CEMicrosoft Windows CE is an operating system developed by Microsoft for embedded systems. Windows CE is a distinct operating system and kernel, rather than a trimmed-down version of desktop Windows...
Compiler support
The GNU Compiler CollectionGNU Compiler Collection
The GNU Compiler Collection is a compiler system produced by the GNU Project supporting various programming languages. GCC is a key component of the GNU toolchain...
(GCC) is the main compiler for software development on the Loongson platform. To target code for the Loongson 2F processor, GCC 4.4 or later should be used with the flags
-march=loongson2f and -mtune=loongson2f. To target code for the Loongson 3A processor, GCC 4.6 or later should be used with the flags -march=loongson3a and -mtune=loongson3a.ICT also ported Open64
Open64
Open64 is an open source, optimizing compiler for the Itanium and x86-64 microprocessor architectures. It derives from the SGI compilers for the MIPS R10000 processor, called MIPSPro. It was initially released in 2000 as GNU GPL software under the name Pro64. The following year, University of...
, an advanced optimizing compiler, to the Loongson II platform.
User applications
Open source applications on Linux Platform can be ported with little effort. Most common open sourceOpen source
The term open source describes practices in production and development that promote access to the end product's source materials. Some consider open source a philosophy, others consider it a pragmatic methodology...
applications (including OpenOffice.org
OpenOffice.org
OpenOffice.org, commonly known as OOo or OpenOffice, is an open-source application suite whose main components are for word processing, spreadsheets, presentations, graphics, and databases. OpenOffice is available for a number of different computer operating systems, is distributed as free software...
, Mozilla Firefox
Mozilla Firefox
Mozilla Firefox is a free and open source web browser descended from the Mozilla Application Suite and managed by Mozilla Corporation. , Firefox is the second most widely used browser, with approximately 25% of worldwide usage share of web browsers...
, Pidgin
Pidgin (software)
Pidgin is an open-source multi-platform instant messaging client, based on a library named libpurple. Libpurple has support for many commonly used instant messaging protocols, allowing the user to log into various services from one application.The number of Pidgin users was estimated to be over 3...
, and MPlayer
MPlayer
MPlayer is a free and open source media player. The program is available for all major operating systems, including Linux and other Unix-like systems, Microsoft Windows and Mac OS X. Versions for OS/2, Syllable, AmigaOS and MorphOS are also available. The Windows version works, with some minor...
) and applications written for the Java platform are supported. For .NET
.NET Framework
The .NET Framework is a software framework that runs primarily on Microsoft Windows. It includes a large library and supports several programming languages which allows language interoperability...
applications, an unofficial port of the Mono
Mono (software)
Mono, pronounced , is a free and open source project led by Xamarin to create an Ecma standard compliant .NET-compatible set of tools including, among others, a C# compiler and a Common Language Runtime....
Common Language Runtime
Common Language Runtime
The Common Language Runtime is the virtual machine component of Microsoft's .NET framework and is responsible for managing the execution of .NET programs. In a process known as just-in-time compilation, the CLR compiles the intermediate language code known as CIL into the machine instructions...
is available online.
Godson microprocessor specifications
| Name / Generation | Model | Frequency [MHz] |
Architecture version |
Year | Cores | Process [nm] |
Transistors [millions] |
Die size [mm^2] |
Power [W] |
Voltage [V] |
L1 Dcache [k] |
L1 Icache [k] |
L2 cache [k] |
Performance [ SPEC Spec -Specification:* Specification , an explicit set of requirements to be satisfied by a material, product, or service** "Spec sheet" or datasheet used to describe something technical... CPU2000] |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Godson-1 (embedded CPU) | 1 | 266 | MIPS32 | 2002 | 1 | 180 | 4 | ? | 1 | ? | 8 | 8 | none | 19/25 |
| 1A | 300 | MIPS32 | 2011? | 1 | 130 | 529 | 1 | 16 | 16 | none | ||||
| 1B | 200 | MIPS32 | 2011 | 1 | 130 | 289 | <0.5 | 8 | 8 | none | ||||
| Godson-2 (singleCore) | 2B | 250 | MIPS-III 64-bit | 2003 | 1 | 180 | ? | ? | ? | ? | 32 | 32 | none | 52/58 |
| 2C | 450 | MIPS-III 64-bit | 2004 | 1 | 180 | 13.5 | 41.5 | ? | ? | 64 | 64 | none | 159/114 | |
| STLS2E | 1000 | MIPS-III 64-bit | 2006 | 1 | 90 | 47 | 36 | 7 | 1.2 | 64 | 64 | 512 | 503/503 | |
| STLS2F | 1200 | MIPS-III 64-bit | 2007 | 1 | 90 | 51 | 43 | 5 | 1.2 | 64 | 64 | 512 | ||
| L2G | 900 - 1000 | MIPS64 | 2010 | 1 | 65 | 100 | 60 | <4 | 1.1? | 64 | 64 | 1024 | ? | |
| L2H? | 1000 | MIPS64 | 2011 | 1 | 65 | 4 | 1.1? | 64 | 64 | 512 | ? | |||
| Godson-3 (multiCore) | L3A/L2GQ | 1000 | MIPS64 | 2009+ | 4 | 65 | 425+ | 174.5 | <15 | 1.1 | 64x4 | 64x4 | 4096 | 568/788 |
| L3B | 1050 | MIPS64 | 2011? | 8 | 65 | 582.6? | 299.8? | <50 | ? | 64x8? | 64x8? | 4096 | ? | |
| L3C? | 1500+ | MIPS64 | 2012? | 16 | 28 | 685 | ? | 20 | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | |
| Godson-T (manyCore) | Godson-T | 1000 | MIPS32 | ? | 64 | 28? | ? | ? | ? | ? | 32x64 | 16x64 | 256x16 | ? |
| Name / Generation | Model | Frequency [MHz] |
Architecture version |
Year | Cores | Process [nm] |
Transistors [millions] |
Die size [mm^2] |
Power [W] |
Voltage [V] |
L1 Dcache [k] |
L1 Icache [k] |
L2 cache [k] |
Performance [ SPEC Spec -Specification:* Specification , an explicit set of requirements to be satisfied by a material, product, or service** "Spec sheet" or datasheet used to describe something technical... CPU2000] |
Loongson-based systems
Euro
The euro is the official currency of the eurozone: 17 of the 27 member states of the European Union. It is also the currency used by the Institutions of the European Union. The eurozone consists of Austria, Belgium, Cyprus, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg,...
100 Loongson II computer design called Longmeng (Dragon Dream) was announced by Lemote.
In June 2006 at Computex'2006, YellowSheepRiver announced the Municator YSR-639, a small form factor
Small form factor
A small form factor is a computer form factor designed to minimize the volume of a desktop computer. For comparison purposes, the size of an SFF case is usually measured in litres. SFFs are available in a variety of sizes and shapes, including shoeboxes, cubes, and book-sized PCs...
computer based on the 400 MHz Loongson 2.
Currently, Loongson boxes that come with a 667 MHz Godson 2E processor or a 800 MHz Godson 2F processor are sold in China at CNY1599 (~US$200) or CNY 1800 respectively without monitor, mouse, or keyboard.
As of July 2008 two manufacturers have announced Loongson 2F products for sale outside China
China
Chinese civilization may refer to:* China for more general discussion of the country.* Chinese culture* Greater China, the transnational community of ethnic Chinese.* History of China* Sinosphere, the area historically affected by Chinese culture...
.
- A Dutch company (Van der Led), in April 2008, announced a 8.9" subnotebookSubnotebookA subnotebook is a class of laptop computers that are smaller and lighter than a typical laptop....
, named Jisus. As of September 2008, however, no orders have been fulfilled, the manufacturer does not respond to inquiries, and the product is no longer on their catalogue. - A French company (EMTEC), in June 2008, announced a 10" subnotebookSubnotebookA subnotebook is a class of laptop computers that are smaller and lighter than a typical laptop....
under the brand name GdiumGdiumThe Gdium is a subnotebook / netbook computer produced by EMTEC. The Gdium product is distinguished by its unique Loongson MIPS processor and the use of a USB key as a primary storage device...
http://www.gdium.com/en/product, to be sold for "less than 399€" running Mandriva LinuxMandriva LinuxMandriva Linux is a Linux distribution distributed by Mandriva. It uses the RPM Package Manager...
. EMTEC announced the subnotebook would be available for sale in September in Europe, the United States, and China. EMTECEMTECEMTEC is part of the Dexxon Group headquartered in Gennevilliers, France and markets consumer computer data storage products and other computer related consumables. Dexxon Group's North American subsidiary, Dexxxon Digital Storage Inc. is located in Lewis Center, Ohio. EMTEC evolved from BASF...
has already shown the devices in public events, and is reaching out to the developer community through the "one laptop per hacker" program.
the new 8.9" netbook from the Chinese manufacturer Lemote that replaced mengloong, Yeeloong (Portable Dragon), running Debian GNU/Linux, is available in Europe from the Dutch company Tekmote Electronics.
Loongson 3A laptop
Loongson insiders revealed a new model based on the Loongson 3A quad-core laptopLaptop
A laptop, also called a notebook, is a personal computer for mobile use. A laptop integrates most of the typical components of a desktop computer, including a display, a keyboard, a pointing device and speakers into a single unit...
has been developed and is expected to launch in August 2011. With a similar design to the MacBook Pro
MacBook Pro
The MacBook Pro is a line of Macintosh portable computers introduced in January 2006 by Apple. It replaced the PowerBook G4 and was the second model, after the iMac, to be announced in the Apple–Intel transition...
from Apple Inc., it will carry a Linux
Linux
Linux is a Unix-like computer operating system assembled under the model of free and open source software development and distribution. The defining component of any Linux system is the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released October 5, 1991 by Linus Torvalds...
operating system by default.
In September 2011, Lemote announced the Yeeloong-8133 13.3" laptop featuring 900MHz, quad-core Loongson-3A/2GQ CPU.
Supercomputers
On 26 December 2007, China revealed its first Loongson based supercomputerSupercomputer
A supercomputer is a computer at the frontline of current processing capacity, particularly speed of calculation.Supercomputers are used for highly calculation-intensive tasks such as problems including quantum physics, weather forecasting, climate research, molecular modeling A supercomputer is a...
with performance 1 teraFLOPS
FLOPS
In computing, FLOPS is a measure of a computer's performance, especially in fields of scientific calculations that make heavy use of floating-point calculations, similar to the older, simpler, instructions per second...
of peak performance, and about 350 GFLOPS measured by linpack
LINPACK
LINPACK is a software library for performing numerical linear algebra on digital computers. It was written in Fortran by Jack Dongarra, Jim Bunch, Cleve Moler, and Gilbert Stewart, and was intended for use on supercomputers in the 1970s and early 1980s...
in Hefei
Hefei
Hefei is the capital and largest city of Anhui Province in Eastern China. A prefecture-level city, it is the political, economic, and cultural centre of Anhui...
, designated as KD-50-I. This supercomputer was designed by a joint team led by Professor Chen Guoliang (陈国良) at the computer science technology department of the University of Science and Technology of China
University of Science and Technology of China
The University of Science and Technology of China is a national research university in Hefei, People's Republic of China. It is a member of the C9 League formed by nine top universities in China...
and ICT (the secondary contractor). KD-50-I is the first Chinese built supercomputer to utilize domestic Chinese CPUs, with a total of more than 330 Loongson-2F CPUs, and nodes are interconnected by ethernet. The size of the computer was roughly equivalent to a household refrigerator and the cost was less than RMB
Renminbi
The Renminbi is the official currency of the People's Republic of China . Renminbi is legal tender in mainland China, but not in Hong Kong or Macau. It is issued by the People's Bank of China, the monetary authority of the PRC...
800,000 (approximately USD $120,000, EURO €80.000).
On 20 April 2010, USTC announced Loongson 3A based KD-60-1. The new supercomputer is a cluster of standard blade server
Blade server
A blade server is a stripped down server computer with a modular design optimized to minimize the use of physical space and energy. Whereas a standard rack-mount server can function with a power cord and network cable, blade servers have many components removed to save space, minimize power...
s with a total of over 80 quad-core Loongson processors, providing theoretical peak performance of 1 TFLOPS and reduces power consumption by 56% compared to the KD-50-I system that has similar performance.
Dawning 6000
The high-performance Dawning 6000, which has a projected speed of over one quadrillion operations per second, will incorporate the Loongson processor as its core. Dawning 6000 is currently jointly developed by the Institute of Computing Technology under the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the Dawning Information Industry Company. Li Guojie, chairman of Dawning Information Industry Company and director and academician of the Institute of Computing Technology, said research and development of the Dawning 6000 is expected to be completed in two years. By then, Chinese-made high-performance computers will be expected to achieve two major breakthroughs: first, the adoption of domestic-made central processing units (CPUs); second, the existing cluster-based system structure of high-performance computers will be changed once the computing speed reaches one quadrillion operations per second.Major events
Development of the first Loongson chip was started in 2001.On 25 June 2008, Hu Weiwu (chief designer of Loongson processors) gave a keynote speech at ISCA
International Symposium on Computer Architecture
The International Symposium on Computer Architecture is generally viewed as the top-tier academic conference on computer architecture.-External references:* in the ACM digital library.* in DBLP.* ....
2008, held in Beijing. The topic of the speech was "Research and Development of Godson processors".
2010 January, Jiangsu
Jiangsu
' is a province of the People's Republic of China, located along the east coast of the country. The name comes from jiang, short for the city of Jiangning , and su, for the city of Suzhou. The abbreviation for this province is "苏" , the second character of its name...
province plans to buy 1.5 million Loongson PCs.
On 24 August 2010, Hu Weiwu presented a paper on Godson-3C at the Hot Chips 22 conference, held in Stanford, USA. The title of the paper was "GS464V: A High-Performance Low-Power XPU with 512-Bit Vector Extension".
On 21 February 2011, Hu Weiwu presented a paper on Godson at ISSCC 2011, held in San Francisco, USA. The title of the paper was "Godson-3B: a 1GHz 40W 8-core 128GFlopS processor in 65nm CMOS".
On 19 August 2011, Dongrui Fan presented a paper on Godson-T at Hot Chips 23 conference at Stanford University (USA), titled "High-Efficient Architecture of Godson-T Many-Core Processor".
See also
- Sinomanic
- Red Flag LinuxRed Flag LinuxRed Flag Linux is a Chinese Linux distribution developed by Red Flag Software. Red Flag's logo is Tux carrying a prominent red flag.The current executive president of Red Flag Software is Jia Dong .-Description:...
- Debian LinuxDebianDebian is a computer operating system composed of software packages released as free and open source software primarily under the GNU General Public License along with other free software licenses. Debian GNU/Linux, which includes the GNU OS tools and Linux kernel, is a popular and influential...
- 863 Program863 ProgramThe 863 program or State High-Tech Development Plan is a program funded and administered by the government of the People's Republic of China intended to stimulate the development of advanced technologies in a wide range of fields for the purpose of rendering China independent of financial...
- Ingenic SemiconductorIngenic SemiconductorIngenic Semiconductor is a Chinese semiconductor company founded 2005 and based in Beijing.- XBurst Embeded CPUs :The XBurst CPU architecture is compatible with MIPSII and has a 8-staged pipeline.XBurst CPU technology consists of 2 parts:...
creates a Chinese MIPS II compatible processor used in many applications.
External links
- Loongson Technology Co., Ltd.
- Jiangsu Lemote Tech Co., Ltd.
- Chinese V-Dragon chip now on sale
- China launches Linux 'dragon chip', challenges Intel
- China's first server 'dragon chip'
- BLX IC Design
- Information page on the Godson II
- Article on Chinese development.
- Prof. Li Guojie page
- AMD and Blx Ic Design Corporation Open New Computing Client Development Center In China AMD pressrelease.
- Chinese design center spins Linux-based "computing client" designs article @Linuxdevices
- Chinese miniPC giveaway targets Apple, Microsoft article @Linuxdevices
- Godson 2E by STMicroelectronics Image
- STMicroelectronics Loongson-2E Datasheet 2007-04-26
- STMicroelectronics Loongson-2F Datasheet 2008-07-28
- STMicroelectronics Loongson-2F/LP Datasheet 2009-01-30|date=25 January 2011}}
- Godson Roadmap; The Register 2011-02-25
- Photos of Dawning-6000 Blade Server; The Register 2011-02-25
- Dawning-6000 Launch; PHYSorg.com 2011-03-04
