They are making a critical mistake here by not letting users pre-order the next batch. It says "Sold Out" and you can't do anything else. They could make hundreds or thousands of sales over the next day or two due to their free launch publicity, but they're fucking blocking everyone from paying for it.
Most of the folks like me who would have bought something today while reading about it will just forget about it later. These guys are missing out on a huge opportunity.
> They are making a critical mistake here by not letting users pre-order the next batch.
It's possible that we can thank the FTC for this:
The Federal Trade Commission’s (FTC’s) Mail or Telephone Order Rule covers all merchandise ordered by mail, phone, over the internet, or via the fax machine. It stipulates that, if a merchant does not promise a specific delivery time, the merchandise ordered must be delivered within 30 days of the merchant’s receipt of the order (or the date merchandise is charged to your credit card). If the company is unable to ship within the promised time, the company must give the buyer the choice of agreeing to the delay or canceling the order and receiving a prompt refund. However, if you are applying for credit to pay for your purchase and a company doesn't promise a shipping time, the company has 50 days to ship after receiving your order.
In other words, in the United States, it is not legal to take pre-orders, and incur a delay, without offering customers their money back. So 100,000 pre-orders could come in, and in case of a delay -- since they are forced to offer a refund -- they could lose, potentially, all of their funding.
Imagine ordering parts for 100,000 boards and having 50% of your customers take their money and run, in case of a delay. That's a fairly unmanageable risk.
Consider that the Parallella is not their intended product. The Parallella is a dev platform/proof of concept to get people to design the Epiphany into new products.
They're not likely making money on the Parallella - in fact a lot of the delay for the Kickstarter campaign was due to issues related to cost (e.g. the design is cut to the bone, and they managed to eventually get very good pricing from Xilinx for the Zynq etc.). It looked like they were in trouble for a while until they got a cash injection from Ericsson and Carmel Ventures early this year.
As such, while they'd certainly benefit from more exposure, and getting it in the hands of more people, they also have every reason to manage the process so building boards doesn't get in the way of actually evolving their chip designs etc. too.
I just received the shipping confirmation for my 16-core kickstarter board.
Since they are relatively low volume, it seems to be pretty hard for them to get the necessary parts from suppliers reliably. I think they need a huge customer for just the chip (and hence plenty of working capital), or a large investment infusion to be able to deliver more boards in high volumes. They seem to be focused on finishing out what they have sold so far before committing to any new sales, which is probably a good thing since it's taken them so long to just fill the kickstarter orders.
I would expect to see them on HN again in the future if anything positive happens, it's how I found their kickstarter, after all.
You should go check out the bitcoin mining hardware market if you want to see how well things go for a company that slips a ship date by even a week... charge backs, BBB complaints, mail and wire fraud investigations, lawsuits, bad press...
Edit:
Ok, here's my quick summary. Please correct me if I'm wrong:
This looks like a small PCB (raspberrypi-alike) that sits the main attraction: a 16- or 64-core Epiphany coprocessor, as well as an ARM cpu to run the OS. Not sure how these relate in performance to other coprocessors (GPUs with OpenCL?). Power draw seems low (5W). Would love to read more about the architecture, why Epiphany processors are special, etc.
It's a dual ARM core Zynq SoC + the Epiphany. The Zynq has an on-die FPGA. Part of the FPGA is used for "glue" for the Epiphany, but you can update the FPGA config as well, with some care.
The main CPU is substantially faster than the Pi, but it doesn't have HW accelerated graphics, so it's not a speed daemon for desktop/workstation type use.
As for the Epiphany, assume that it'll be slower than most GPU's for tasks that GPU's are good for. That is, if you can make do with few instruction streams, the Epiphany is not well suited for it, as most GPUs will blow the current chips out of the water in terms of performance.
If, on the other hand, your problem is poorly suited for GPUs due to lots of independent instruction streams, it may be better suited.
One of the most interesting aspects of the Epiphany is that is can also be connected into a grid - each chip has four high speed links that can be connected to other Epiphany chips, or be used to interface with the main CPU or off-chip memory.
The cores can all access each-others memory without any special instructions, including that of the cores on other Epiphany chips that are hooked up via the external links - the only difference between in-core and out-of-core memory access is the speed.
I was informed a few days ago that my 16 core Parallella has shipped; I had hoped, when I ordered, that it would come earlier in the year before exams but the fact that it shipped- several kickstarters which did not deliver have made me wary- has me ecstatic to hold it in my hands.
I have a great amount of respect for the Parallella team: to be able to kickstart a custom chip, that promises very interesting applications, and deliver it within several months of the estimated delivery date with the setbacks they have had is absolutely astonishing for me. While I can't comment on the quality of the final product yet, I would say that they know how to run an excellent campaign.
Mine shipped a few days ago as well. Sadly they seemed to have completely ignored my address change request and the board is shipping to my old address in another country. Grrr.
> the 64-core Parallella is still setting the standard in terms of energy efficiency. In fact, it could be argued that it’s the most efficient computer in the world today
I'd be curious if it beats GreenArrays (http://www.greenarraychips.com/) numbers of picojoules per operation. I wonder if those numbers are published for Parallela?
I work a lot on GreenArrays, and I highly, highly doubt this claim. An F18 core has 1152 bits of SRAM on it, much less than these cores, which I believe I read have 32 KB. Moreover, while the Parallella is clocked (like almost every computer out there) the F18 is asynchronous.
From reading the parallella docs, it looks like that chips runs 5 W on a "typical workload" while the GA144 runs .25 W at an absolute theoretical maximum, for a 20x difference in energy consumption.
Pardon the ignorance but are all 64 cores available to the OS -- as in, if I run htop, will I see 64 little bars at the top of the terminal? I would think not if I'm understanding this architecture correctly...
I'm looking forward to getting mine. I ordered it back in October and they recently said the Zynq-2010 based boards would be shipped in mid-May. I wish they would have been more up front about the delays. There were long periods where there was no communication from the company. I didn't order through Kickstarter but directly from Adapteva.
I was hoping to buy a few of their 16-core model for a commercial application, and have been in touch with Adapteva but got no reply. It seems like they really don't have the ability to supply the demand for their product.
What do you think about this + Haskell video encoder / decoder? I'm a little ignorant about media processing, but I guess it to be processors scalable with the right encoder / decoder, am I wrong?
I see this thing does OpenCL on a completely different architecture. Recent tesseract ocr versions supports opencl. Will I be able to run tesseract on this thing? Would I even want to?
in principle, yes, but the parallela board isn't exactly the fastest of all the embedded boards.
also, OpenCL apparently isn't the preferred programming model for the epiphany, so performance wont be as good as bare-metal (but that is practically a tautology for any OpenCL device..)
Well Erlang could run, after all they supply a Ubuntu distro for it. However, you cannot run Erlang on the Epiphany, you need to code some BIFs to take advantage of the multitude of cores.
[+] [-] fragsworth|12 years ago|reply
Most of the folks like me who would have bought something today while reading about it will just forget about it later. These guys are missing out on a huge opportunity.
[+] [-] runeks|12 years ago|reply
It's possible that we can thank the FTC for this:
The Federal Trade Commission’s (FTC’s) Mail or Telephone Order Rule covers all merchandise ordered by mail, phone, over the internet, or via the fax machine. It stipulates that, if a merchant does not promise a specific delivery time, the merchandise ordered must be delivered within 30 days of the merchant’s receipt of the order (or the date merchandise is charged to your credit card). If the company is unable to ship within the promised time, the company must give the buyer the choice of agreeing to the delay or canceling the order and receiving a prompt refund. However, if you are applying for credit to pay for your purchase and a company doesn't promise a shipping time, the company has 50 days to ship after receiving your order.
http://www.hcs.harvard.edu/~scas/wp/wordpress/?page_id=24
In other words, in the United States, it is not legal to take pre-orders, and incur a delay, without offering customers their money back. So 100,000 pre-orders could come in, and in case of a delay -- since they are forced to offer a refund -- they could lose, potentially, all of their funding.
Imagine ordering parts for 100,000 boards and having 50% of your customers take their money and run, in case of a delay. That's a fairly unmanageable risk.
[+] [-] vidarh|12 years ago|reply
They're not likely making money on the Parallella - in fact a lot of the delay for the Kickstarter campaign was due to issues related to cost (e.g. the design is cut to the bone, and they managed to eventually get very good pricing from Xilinx for the Zynq etc.). It looked like they were in trouble for a while until they got a cash injection from Ericsson and Carmel Ventures early this year.
As such, while they'd certainly benefit from more exposure, and getting it in the hands of more people, they also have every reason to manage the process so building boards doesn't get in the way of actually evolving their chip designs etc. too.
[+] [-] qdog|12 years ago|reply
Since they are relatively low volume, it seems to be pretty hard for them to get the necessary parts from suppliers reliably. I think they need a huge customer for just the chip (and hence plenty of working capital), or a large investment infusion to be able to deliver more boards in high volumes. They seem to be focused on finishing out what they have sold so far before committing to any new sales, which is probably a good thing since it's taken them so long to just fill the kickstarter orders.
I would expect to see them on HN again in the future if anything positive happens, it's how I found their kickstarter, after all.
[+] [-] onemore360|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] icelancer|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jdubs|12 years ago|reply
http://shop.adapteva.com/
[+] [-] dsl|12 years ago|reply
I'm still waiting on my Coin.
[+] [-] unknown|12 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] awda|12 years ago|reply
Edit: Ok, here's my quick summary. Please correct me if I'm wrong:
This looks like a small PCB (raspberrypi-alike) that sits the main attraction: a 16- or 64-core Epiphany coprocessor, as well as an ARM cpu to run the OS. Not sure how these relate in performance to other coprocessors (GPUs with OpenCL?). Power draw seems low (5W). Would love to read more about the architecture, why Epiphany processors are special, etc.
[+] [-] vidarh|12 years ago|reply
The main CPU is substantially faster than the Pi, but it doesn't have HW accelerated graphics, so it's not a speed daemon for desktop/workstation type use.
As for the Epiphany, assume that it'll be slower than most GPU's for tasks that GPU's are good for. That is, if you can make do with few instruction streams, the Epiphany is not well suited for it, as most GPUs will blow the current chips out of the water in terms of performance.
If, on the other hand, your problem is poorly suited for GPUs due to lots of independent instruction streams, it may be better suited.
One of the most interesting aspects of the Epiphany is that is can also be connected into a grid - each chip has four high speed links that can be connected to other Epiphany chips, or be used to interface with the main CPU or off-chip memory.
The cores can all access each-others memory without any special instructions, including that of the cores on other Epiphany chips that are hooked up via the external links - the only difference between in-core and out-of-core memory access is the speed.
[+] [-] mintplant|12 years ago|reply
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adapteva#Products
[+] [-] aaron695|12 years ago|reply
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/adapteva/parallella-a-s...
[+] [-] Everlag|12 years ago|reply
I have a great amount of respect for the Parallella team: to be able to kickstart a custom chip, that promises very interesting applications, and deliver it within several months of the estimated delivery date with the setbacks they have had is absolutely astonishing for me. While I can't comment on the quality of the final product yet, I would say that they know how to run an excellent campaign.
[+] [-] teh_klev|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] sitkack|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] avmich|12 years ago|reply
I'd be curious if it beats GreenArrays (http://www.greenarraychips.com/) numbers of picojoules per operation. I wonder if those numbers are published for Parallela?
[+] [-] daniel-cussen|12 years ago|reply
From reading the parallella docs, it looks like that chips runs 5 W on a "typical workload" while the GA144 runs .25 W at an absolute theoretical maximum, for a 20x difference in energy consumption.
http://www.parallella.org/board/
[+] [-] vidarh|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] wcchandler|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] wmf|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] zhemao|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] brucehart|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] JoelHobson|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] bitL|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] damian2000|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] izietto|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dnautics|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] markvdb|12 years ago|reply
I see this thing does OpenCL on a completely different architecture. Recent tesseract ocr versions supports opencl. Will I be able to run tesseract on this thing? Would I even want to?
[+] [-] foxhill|12 years ago|reply
also, OpenCL apparently isn't the preferred programming model for the epiphany, so performance wont be as good as bare-metal (but that is practically a tautology for any OpenCL device..)
[+] [-] kefka|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jacquesm|12 years ago|reply
See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reversible_computing
Note that this is the computing equivalent of a straight line.
[+] [-] andyl|12 years ago|reply
Related question: is Erlang running on Parallella yet?
I remain very interested - 64 or even 16 cores on a small form factor would be incredible.
[+] [-] acomjean|12 years ago|reply
I don't have the video cable yet and still have to attach the heat sink. They'd really like you to have a fan, so I have some work to assemble one.
http://www.parallella.org/quick-start/
[+] [-] ccozan|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] wtracy|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rposborne|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] vidarh|12 years ago|reply