Connecting System-Level Flows To Implementation Tools


By Ann Steffora Mutschler With the complexity explosion occurring in SoC design today, there is a relentless force to push design decisions further up in terms of abstraction. Resolving issues at the gate level is not possible any more because there just isn’t enough time or resources. Further, the resulting design may not even be competitive because optimization at the gate level can leave ... » read more

Tailoring IP, Tools And Flows


By Ann Steffora Mutschler As SoC and system complexity rises continually and software drives much more in a system, specific vertical application areas will require tailored IP and tool flows to allow designers to meet time-to-market demands. Today, many systems are designed around a platform, which contains most of the STAR IP—processors, GPUs, memory controllers, interconnects, memory s... » read more

Connecting System-Level Flows To Implementation Tools


By Ann Steffora Mutschler With the complexity explosion occurring in SoC design today, there is a relentless force to push design decisions further up in terms of abstraction. Resolving issues at the gate level is not possible any more because there just isn’t enough time or resources. Further, the resulting design may not even be competitive because optimization at the gate level can leave ... » read more

Tailoring IP, Tools And Flows


By Ann Steffora Mutschler As SoC and system complexity rises continually and software drives much more in a system, specific vertical application areas will require tailored IP and tool flows to allow designers to meet time-to-market demands. Today, many systems are designed around a platform, which contains most of the STAR IP—processors, GPUs, memory controllers, interconnects, memory s... » read more

Models, Models, Models…


By Jon McDonald It's all about the models. Sometimes I get the feeling that progress is blazing along. Everyone I talk to is interested in ESL design. The value of the capabilities and possibility of dramatic impact on the design process is monumental. It's kind of like having an amazing sports car that will blow everything off the track but you are stuck on an island with no track and no way ... » read more

Material Effects: Trading Performance For Power


By Ann Steffora Mutschler Power impacts everything, even when it comes to semiconductor manufacturing materials. While bulk CMOS technology still reigns supreme, there are a number of advanced materials being suggested as replacements when it runs out of steam at around 15nm, including silicon on insulator (SOI)—particularly in combination with FinFET multigate structures on SOI—silicon ge... » read more

Packaging’s Power Play


By Ann Steffora Mutschler In the not-too-distant past packaging was not an issue IC designers had to think much about. But now, due to smaller geometries and rising complexity, managing power in the entire system has become a major concern for system architects. IC and package designers now must work closely throughout the design process to make sure no surprises come up down the road. A... » read more

Power Next


Development teams are faced with many tradeoffs when defining a new product: How much should it cost? What functionality or features need to be included? And what level of performance is required? As an example, in order to reduce costs it’s possible to trade away performance by implementing functionality in software instead of in application-specific hardware. For an SoC that already inc... » read more

The Elusive Min Power Definition


By Ed Sperling Put a fully charged smart phone in a bad reception area and the battery will run out in a fraction of the time it normally lasts in a good reception area. While this may be an annoyance to consumers, who need to recharge their phones more often, it’s a serious problem in SoC design. Minimum power should be a simple number, but the reality is it’s more like a distribution ... » read more

Blog Review: Jan. 5


By Ed Sperling Mentor’s Robin Bornoff returns to his beer fridge with a New Year’s resolution for sobriety and a revelation that an empty refrigerator never cools as well as a full one. Well, there’s always Diet Coke and double-shot iced espresso. Cadence’s Tom Anderson sheds some long overdue light on the famous processor “divide bug” that generated mostly right answers. This o... » read more

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