Challenges In IC And Electronic Systems Verification


By Aveek Sarkar Designing successful electronic systems that can meet the needs of a challenging and quickly evolving mobile market requires design teams to solve critical problems such as power efficiency, unrealistic schedules, and cost-down considerations. In this first of a three-part series, we will look at these challenges. Part 1: The Growing Challenges Designing electronic systems ... » read more

Shock Value


By Norman Chang Chip-Package-System (CPS) ESD simulation enables system-wide ESD robustness validation, a common challenge in automotive and aerospace applications. To enable CPS ESD analysis requires an accurate chip electrostatic discharge (ESD) model and a comprehensive system-level ESD methodology. Using an accurate ESD chip model provides the following three benefits. First it helps de... » read more

Clean Your Clock


Lowering power consumption seems to be on every designer’s mind these days. And yet when asked about applying low-power design techniques, many engineers respond, “Well, we do clock gating ... and that’s about it.” Clock gating is low-hanging fruit when it comes to low-power design. Clock gating is also well automated, as witnessed by capabilities in modern logic synthesis tools. The... » read more

Reducing Cost And Mitigating Risk


By Aveek Sarkar & Lawrence Williams How will you design your next generation of products and keep pace with rapidly evolving market needs, while managing your margins? Many industries face these same design challenges. The speed of new product development—especially for meeting complex new design requirements—has never been more demanding. Historically, the rise in product development ... » read more

Waste Not, Want Not


Power is the new timing …. performance per watt … low-power design ... power performance trade-offs … the list of terms goes on and on, but there is no denying that power has now become the primary design objective. So what does it really take to manage power in a modern system-on-a-chip (SoC) design? Power is an “equal opportunity problem,” and all can contribute to the solution. ... » read more

Signal Integrity’s Growing Complexity


By Matt Elmore In Part 1, we reviewed the importance of simultaneous switching output (SSO) timing and the challenges associated with double data rate (DDR) simulation complexity. DDR memory interfacing has reached incredible levels of performance (17 Gb/s), requiring precise quantification and reduction of noise. In order to account for each noise contributor, we must model systems end-to-... » read more

Design For Reliability


By Arvind Shanmugavel Faster processors, lowered power targets and shrinking technology have increased the complexity of integrated circuit (IC) reliability analysis. With the 20nm node becoming mainstream, IC design teams are fast re-tooling their analysis methodologies to simulate and capture various reliability failure mechanisms. Electromigration (EM) analysis, thermal analysis and Electro... » read more

Signal Integrity’s Growing Complexity


By Matt Elmore While in the market for a memory upgrade recently, I was surprised by the availability of commercial DDR memories. You can get 8GB of DDR3 memory, transferring 17GB/s, relatively inexpensively. The progress in memory design is outstanding. From smartphones to gaming PCs, quick communication between the IC and off-chip memory is key to enabling the performance we demand in the... » read more

Preparing For 3DX


By Aveek Sarkar Undoubtedly we live in the age of mobility—smartphones, tablets, and ultra-books have transformed the way we work, live, and communicate. The worldwide smartphone market’s forecasted 24% CAGR, between 2010 and 2015 provides unique opportunities1. In emerging economies, more than 1 billion consumers are ready for the next new mobile platform2. Success in this market demands ... » read more

Stacking The Deck


By Matt Elmore Can we finally say that 3D-IC design has emerged from the realm of theory and research to actual commercial implementation? Xilinx recently announced initial shipments of its Virtex-7 H580T FPGA, described as “The world’s first 3D heterogeneous all programmable product.” The benefits of 3D implementation are many, as are its challenges. One of the hottest 3D-IC topics t... » read more

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