Awesome projects
- https://simplifier.neocities.org/: a truly awesome list of simpler ways to accomplish necessary tasks.
- scamp-cpu
Good quick video overview, discusses some of the complexities with lithography at the tiny processor size in current use. This brings up some of the kinds of issues a Civboot would have to face.
microprocessor chronology and RAM timeline gives a basic idea of circuit sizes through time
- paper page 26 says that a fab in 1980 cost ~$100 million (whew, that's more than expected)
- Seeking Alpha Article with helpful graph graph
- 1980's clean room Intel fab
- National Systems of Innovation: Creating High Technology Industries By S. Peters
- "In 1970 the cost of building a fabrication plant was $3 million, but by 1980 the cost had reached approximately $75 million. Throughout the 1980s costs carried on rising, by 1985 the cost of a fabrication plant had risen to around $150 million"
- 3MHz at 3um (1983 RISC-II), 40k transistors
- 1GHz possible at 250 nm (1999 AMD Athalon), 22M transistors
- The Commodore 64 (8bit 1MHz 64KB RAM 20KB ROM)
- Made in 1983 and is still the most widely sold single computer of all time.
- 10,000+ commercial software titles were made for it.
- Capable of 16 bit color graphics, as well as sound
- It was made almost entirely in house, including custom integrated circuit chips from MOS Technology
Thin Film Transistors made directly on glass using only low temperature processes, which may be replicatabeable by a Civboot at first glance (PECVD and RF sputtering). It looks like the characteristics are extremely good as well. This book seems like a decent reference.