Re: CSG 4510 and 4567 and Dmagic reverse engineering

From: Rainer Buchty <rainer_at_buchty.net>
Date: Fri, 30 Jul 2010 10:49:48 +0200 (CEST)
Message-ID: <alpine.DEB.1.10.1007301044100.6648@athlon>
On Wed, 28 Jul 2010, Groepaz wrote:

> "However, it can be extremely hard to retrieve the C source from an 
> executable, but you can't even rip the equivalent of a simple 
> disassembly from these programmable devices, let alone the Verilog 
> source."

Even if you could rip the bitstream from a programmable logic device, it 
usually won't help as you first would need to determine how the 
bitstream format reflects the internal logic.

About the last time someone did this with bigger chips, was about 10 
years ago with the original Xilinx Virtex series. I'm not aware that any 
later bitstreams were (officially) reverse-engineered.

As for the CSG chips, the most promising effort is most likely etching 
off the casing and putting it under a *good* microscope. Good as in "you 
won't have it at home as your average 200x zoom microscope use for 
taking photos of tiny minerals won't do it".

Rainer


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