Microwatt Grows Up

Explore the evolution of Microwatt, an open-source POWER CPU implementation for affordable FPGAs, in this 47-minute conference talk from linux.conf.au 2021. Discover the recent advancements in Microwatt's capabilities, including the addition of a memory management unit, privilege modes, interrupts, a floating-point unit, an interrupt controller, and a level-2 cache, enabling it to boot Linux. Learn about the Power ISA basics, Linux requirements, and implementation details of various components. Gain insights into potential applications for Microwatt and understand how these developments have increased accessibility to POWER architecture.

Introduction
Power ISA basics
Power ISA versions
Linux requirements
Interrupts
Privilege modes
Memory management unit - implementation
More memory!
Floating-point unit
FPU - Data paths (Simplified)
Hardware Random Number Generator
Linux kernel hacks
What can we use it for?
Thank you!