The GA144 gets its efficiency from the fact that everything about the design is simple and it uses very few transistors. How many transistors in an A9? The async nature of the GA144 processors saves power if they are stalled, waiting for something to happen. But if they are in a spin loop doing timing, they are as inefficient as any other MCU. The static power is very low because they aren't using state of the art, low voltage processes with leaky transistors. With Vcc at 1.8 V the transistors can turn on and off hard.
I think it is a mistake to compare the GA144 to an ARM. They are not really designed for the same sorts of tasks. There are big ARMs for large memory apps which the GA144 is entirely unsuited to and there are small ARMs with more limited memory that have no where near the power of the GA144. But then the GA144 with all processors running flat out uses power like the big ARM... so where is the right comparison?
I compare the GA144 to FPGAs. The GA144 has an array of very small processors with very limited memory. But they can be viewed as very beefy logic blocks that execute sequentially rather than parallel logic. To use the GA144 for something useful you need to design your app to suit. Thinking of it as a standard CPU won't get you very far.
You won't be running a useful version of Linux on the GA144 and it is too expensive to suit toaster type apps. But it might be the right device for any number of embedded apps that need raw performance like hearing aids or other signal processing apps.
I'm not sure what the GA144 would be great at. I can find a few apps it would be good for such as a small analog I/O board I currently build and need to respin because the FPGA is EOL. But I'm not sure I would ever use the GA144 for this product because it may go EOL at any time depending on the company. They are very small and I see no sign they are getting bigger. Will they be around in 5 years, 10 years?
I think it is a mistake to compare the GA144 to an ARM. They are not really designed for the same sorts of tasks. There are big ARMs for large memory apps which the GA144 is entirely unsuited to and there are small ARMs with more limited memory that have no where near the power of the GA144. But then the GA144 with all processors running flat out uses power like the big ARM... so where is the right comparison?
I compare the GA144 to FPGAs. The GA144 has an array of very small processors with very limited memory. But they can be viewed as very beefy logic blocks that execute sequentially rather than parallel logic. To use the GA144 for something useful you need to design your app to suit. Thinking of it as a standard CPU won't get you very far.
You won't be running a useful version of Linux on the GA144 and it is too expensive to suit toaster type apps. But it might be the right device for any number of embedded apps that need raw performance like hearing aids or other signal processing apps.
I'm not sure what the GA144 would be great at. I can find a few apps it would be good for such as a small analog I/O board I currently build and need to respin because the FPGA is EOL. But I'm not sure I would ever use the GA144 for this product because it may go EOL at any time depending on the company. They are very small and I see no sign they are getting bigger. Will they be around in 5 years, 10 years?