A group of Chinese scientists has published (PDF) a paper titled “Pushing the Limits of Machine Design: Automated CPU Design with AI.” The paper details the researchers’ work in designing a new industrial-scale RISC-V CPU in under 5 hours. It is claimed this AI-automated feat was about 1000x faster than a human team could have finished a comparable CPU design. However, some may poke fun at the resulting AI-designed CPU performing approximately on par with an i486.
