category: A System Perspective

category: IoT, Security & Automotive

Thermal Interface Materials: The Unknown Entity?
By Mathew Clark - 25 Jun, 2015 - Comments: 0

Thermal interface materials (TIMs) are becoming more important in all application areas and between different component parts. Any semiconductor, ranging from LEDs to high-power electronics, is becoming smaller, yet producing more power. In many ways the physical design limits have been reached for packaging, allowing entire components to have a total thermal resistance of less than 0.1 K/W. Ho... » read more

When Things Go Wrong Even When You’re Doing the Right Thing
By Joseph Hupcey III - 28 May, 2015 - Comments: 0

By Kurt Takara and Joe Hupcey III “Isolation. Retention. Level shifters. Dynamic voltage scaling. I’m doing all the right things to reduce the power consumption of my design by adding all of this power control logic. But because of this new low power circuitry, I’m seeing fresh clock domain crossing (CDC) problems that are making my design do all the wrong things; and my trusty old low... » read more

The Auto Industry Taking Things Into Their Own Hands
By Mathew Clark - 23 Apr, 2015 - Comments: 0

A new standard is here! I can hear a collective groan, but I suggest we quiet down and see what this new direction has to offer. When Audi AG, BMW AG, Daimler AG, Porsche AG, and Volkswagen AG get together to work up a document, there is a shift happening. Although this standard is not out-of-the-oven-fresh, it will mean a change in the industry in the near future. But before I continue, I want... » read more

Chip-Package-Board Optimization: The Future Of Integrated Co-Design
By John Park - 26 Mar, 2015 - Comments: 0

Multi-die and three-dimensional packages have made breakout and routing of extremely high-pin-count devices on PCBs very difficult. Keeping track of all the signals and pins is also a task that has just about outgrown current methods. Many companies simply use a spreadsheet for tracking signals. With no central database or accurate device modeling and rule-based optimization, design intent is o... » read more

Defining Functional Accuracy
By Jon McDonald - 26 Feb, 2015 - Comments: 0

I have been heavily involved in a project that recently completed. It involved creating virtual platforms (VPs) for a number of Altera’s FPGA SoCs. If you’re interested in more information, an announcement on the VP availability went out last week. Some of the modeled platforms existed and some were in various stages of development. The goal of the project was to deliver functionally acc... » read more

Simulation Performance Driven By Model Efficiency
By Jon McDonald - 29 Jan, 2015 - Comments: 0

In real estate it’s all about location, location, location. For system level simulation it’s all about performance, performance, performance. I have heard many opinions on the performance of SystemC and TLM simulations: some positive, some negative, much of the opinion based on hearsay or other unreliable information. I believe the performance of the simulation is mainly driven by the model... » read more

A Dream For The Future Of Real System-Level Design Validation
By Guilhem Depelley - 29 Oct, 2014 - Comments: 1

"I have a dream…that one day…all SoCs will be free…of bugs and verifying them will be a walk in the park. I have a dream…that one day…all software engineers will be able to validate their software on pre-silicon hardware at the speed of light, delivering fully functional embedded software “before-on-time” for tape-out. I have a dream today…Well, if not today, how about first ... » read more

How Many Levels Of Abstraction Are Needed?
By Jon McDonald - 23 Oct, 2014 - Comments: 0

Recently I was having a conversation with a user who was creating cycle accurate SystemC models. My initial thought was, "Why would this be necessary?" Through the course of discussions I realized that he did have a design questions that required that level of accuracy and the simulation performance trade-offs were appropriate for his needs. His cycle accurate SystemC models were running at abo... » read more

Designing In The Dark
By Jon McDonald - 25 Sep, 2014 - Comments: 0

While power optimization has received significant focus recently, it is still largely a hidden cost to most hardware and software engineers. A significant problem is the lack of visibility into the impact of decisions while decisions are being made. Often an engineer working on a system will have no practical way of measuring the impact of their design decisions on the system power consumption.... » read more

Not Invented Here Syndrome
By Jon McDonald - 21 Aug, 2014 - Comments: 0

Recently I have made some choices on IP I needed to re-use and some I decided not to re-use. This got me thinking about the general topic of reuse in system-level design. Most will agree with a non-specific statement that reuse is a good thing, but the details tend to be a bit more ambiguous. Clouding the reuse question are occasional infections of NIH Syndrome (Not Invented Here), even if s... » read more

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