386 IP Core

Maybe the reason is that a 386 is much more complicated than an 8086.

vax, 9000

there is no free or open-source 386 there is no free or open-source 86 :( all what is available is commercial

I have a partial 86 (some assembly programs working) but that project is on ice

Antti

Why bother with 80386? With other CPU architectures you can run your CPU faster, get better system performance, and use less LUT in your FPGA. 80386 was available around 1985 (?), so if there is any patents they should have expired. I think design patents only last 14 years in US (please let me know if it is wrong!) and can be different in other countries.

Joe

Hello,

Anyone can write programmes for embedded systems with 386 processor using tools, everybody's familliar with. It's just mere PC-AT. No additional knowledge needed to program it.

In some cases time-to-market factor may have the biggest priority : )

greetings! Marcin Olak

Well there is a semi-free simulation one :-) As soon as I have some more time I will add the synthesizable version.

See

Regards, Hans.

I've

to

not -

yes, I know the above, but that only precompiled simulation, not match for those who want to use it in FPGA

Antti

No - the great majority of programmers and tools for x86 processors are for non-embedded systems. If you have a big enough and fast enough embedded x86 system, you can pretend that embedded issues like efficiency, memory footprint, and limited resources don't matter, and then allow your pc-programmers to work on it. That gives you access to cheaper programmers and lower time-to-market, at a higher cost of hardware. But you won't get that kind of performance from an 386 core on an fpga - a cheapo embedded x86 chip will give you ten times the performance for a tenth of the cost.