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Comment by morphle | Hacker News Reader

Much, much larger and better $113 FPGA development board with free 1 year license: https://www.microsemi.com/existing-parts/parts/139680 You never pay the $159 list price. Besides, the FPGA alone would cost you >$350 retail. Arrives with Risc-V preprogrammed and 'hello world' type demos on wifi and usb.

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Really exotic and complex board to start with. No community support (think about Digilent or Terasic). I also guess, no examples. I visited a seminar about RISC-V and Microsemi presentation was really weak on this topic. Do not recommend this for getting started. Only for experienced users looking for pain. Cheap and affordable board is for example Max1000 from arrow.

Examples RiscV softcore, ADC, wifi, 12,5 Gbps Serdes(!), tic tac to, console echo. https://github.com/Future-Electronics-Design-Center/Avalanch... https://github.com/RISCV-on-Microsemi-FPGA/PolarFire-Eval-Ki...

Community support is indeed just beginning but the risc-V community and the HiFive1 - SiFive community support these polarfire FPGA's. Even 50 Risc-V softcores fit on this FPGA.

After the one year, the software costs $995 per year ("The board includes a 1 Year Libero Design Software Gold License worth $995!"). Not really a good deal for a beginner.

You buy a new board every year for $113 to extend the license. My point remains, its by far the most powerful FPGA for $113 and good for beginners.

Just a happy user, not affiliated with Microchip/Microsemi

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