category: Top Stories

category: Auto, Security & Edge AI

Writing Application Software Directly To The Metal
By Ed Sperling - 13 Mar, 2009 - Comments: 0

By Ed Sperling How necessary is an operating system? That question would have been considered superfluous a decade ago, possibly even blasphemous and career-limiting. But it now is beginning to surface in low-power discussions, particularly in compute-intensive applications where performance and power are both critical. General-purpose operating systems constantly call on the processor fo... » read more

Verifying Low-Power IP And Designs
By Ed Sperling - 13 Mar, 2009 - Comments: 0

By Ed Sperling Verification has always been the time-consuming part of designs. Even at 120nm and above, where power wasn’t much of an issue, verification accounted for an estimated 70 percent of the non-recurring engineering expense in a chip. Since then, the tools to automate design have become more effective, but the complexity of designs has grown by leaps and bounds beyond those tools.... » read more

Low-Power Standards War
By Ann Mutschler - 13 Mar, 2009 - Comments: 0

To the uninitiated, establishing a technology standard may seem straightforward. In reality, the process is mired with technical and political issues as evidenced by the ongoing battle for a de facto low-power design standard between the Unified Power Format (UPF) and the Common Power Format (CPF).   Currently, UPF is with the IEEE for final ratification as P1801, set for vote this month, ... » read more

Plumbing 101: Current Leakage And What to Do About It
By Brian Fuller - 13 Mar, 2009 - Comments: 0

By Brian Fuller Rising demand for mobile products and the march of Moore’s Law have created conditions for a perfect storm that threatens to swamp electronics designs and the market growth those designs target. The catalyst for that storm is leakage, which worsens the smaller devices become. Even in an “off” state, systems can leak like poorly insulated houses. But as the nation think... » read more

NoC Your SoCs Off
By Ed Sperling - 19 Feb, 2009 - Comments: 0

By Ed Sperling The network on a chip (NoC) approach is gaining ground as an essential part of a system on a chip (SoC), providing the same kind of time-to-market advantage that well-tested intellectual property blocks provide. This follows almost eight years of hype about NoCs potential with little to show for it. Times have changed and there appear to be two main drivers, one technological a... » read more

Beyond CMOS: Making Way For The Next-Generation Of Semiconductor Materials
By Cheryl Ajluni - 19 Feb, 2009 - Comments: 0

By Cheryl Ajluni Before the advent of the cell phone, the idea of having access to a phone virtually anytime, anywhere and in a package smaller than a human hand seemed almost impossible. Today that innovation, and others like it, has become an everyday reality. In the process it has helped spawn a technologically-driven society that continually demands more for less and waits impatiently... » read more

The Quest For Faster Data Throughput On A Chip
By Ed Sperling - 19 Feb, 2009 - Comments: 0

By Ed Sperling As with all network topologies, the general rule is the faster the better. Jack Browne, VP of sales and marketing at Sonics, said his customers are asking for higher-speed interconnects. “Right now we’re at 300MHz,” he said. “They want to more than double that in the very near future and eventually get to 1GHz.” Getting to that speed is no simple ... » read more

Next Steps In Verification IP
By Ann Mutschler - 19 Feb, 2009 - Comments: 0

By Ann Steffora Mutschler With the cost of failure at an astronomical high, the last thing chip designers want to worry about is the physical IP they will use to build their SoC. In addition to less willingness on the customer’s behalf to take risks, complexity and economics have driven the need for more off-the-shelf IP and a corresponding rise in interest in verification IP. Compoundi... » read more

The Great Debate: Fewer Functions?
By Ed Sperling - 19 Feb, 2009 - Comments: 0

By Ed Sperling What do you do when you can’t fit any more functionality on a chip without blowing your power budget? That question is being debated inside IBM right now, and one of the more radical concepts is to actually have systems do fewer things. “That trend will happen,” said Brad McCredie, chief architect of the Power6 chip and an IBM Fellow. “I think devices w... » read more

Fewer Engineers Means Fewer Weapons Designs
By Ed Sperling - 22 Jan, 2009 - Comments: 0

By Ed Sperling Uncle Sam wants you—but not on the battlefield. The diminished pool of qualified engineering and science graduates is having a major impact on the defense market. There simply are too few trained engineers to design complex systems for the military at the rate they’re needed, creating a huge hole in a system that has been humming along for the better part of a century. And ... » read more

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