Custom ASIC Contains the World's First Rickroll... in Silicon!
Bitluni's latest project displays a 32x32 pixel animation of Rick Astley's internet-famous song stored inside a custom IC.
In German electronics YouTuber Matthias "bitluni" Balwierz's latest video, he claims to have created what he calls the best chip ever. Why does this IC have such a prestigious title? It is the world's first application-specific IC containing a Rickroll animation!
Inside the application-specific integrated chip (ASIC), bitluni stored 512 bytes of Rick Astley dancing around in 32 by 32-pixel glory. Several hardware pieces are needed to access the tricky GIF. So, bitluni designed a carrier PCB that resembles an Arduino shield. It contains the ASIC and support components. That board connects to bitluni's previous ESP32-S3-based project that outputs VGA video.
How did the ASIC get made in the first place? Through Matt Venn's Tiny Tapeout program. This program gives designers a small block of space on a much larger chip shared with other designs. For example, on TT02, the chip with bitluni's ASIC Rickroll, there were 164 additional circuits. The blocks are connected in a serial chain and managed by an integrated RISC-V microcontroller.
Venn also offers an online training course called Zero to ASIC for anyone who wants to learn about designing an ASIC. The course teaches you how to use the same open-source toolchain that bitluni used. While a GUI design tool is available, many designers choose to use a more traditional description language like Verilog.
Compared to manufacturing PCBs, the turnaround time is much longer with ASICs. For example, after a Tiny Tapeout run closes, it could be nine to 12 months before the chip returns! Imagine waiting over a year to know if your embedded Rickroll will work!
There are arguably cheaper and easier ways to store a few frames of animation data. However, none are as exciting as having the first purpose-specific silicon to animate a Rickroll.