Droop And Silent Data Corruption


By Aakash Jani and Lee Vick Let me set the scene. You are a child psychologist (played by, let’s say, Bruce Willis for illustrative purposes), and you are sitting next to a frightened kid. He turns to you and whispers, “I see dead bits.” Okay, I grant you that’s not exactly the quote, but data center operators are seeing transient errors at an alarming rate, and at scale. These error... » read more

Reducing Design Margins With Silicon Model Calibration


By Guy Cortez and Mark Laird It’s no secret to anyone that chip design gets harder every year. There are two major trends driving these ever-increasing challenges. The first is the continual scaling down to smaller design nodes. Although the pace of new node introduction has slowed somewhat in recent years, the impact of each new geometry and process is more dramatic than ever before. Acce... » read more

IC Test And Quality Requirements Drive New Collaboration


Rapidly increasing chip and package complexity, coupled with an incessant demand for more reliability, has triggered a frenzy of alliances and working relationships that are starting to redefine how chips are tested and monitored. At the core of this shift is a growing recognition that no company can do everything, and that to work together will require much tighter integration of flows, met... » read more

Silent Data Corruption Considerations For Advanced Node Designs


Ensuring reliability, availability, and serviceability (RAS) has long been an important consideration for many types of electronic systems, with major implications for chip design. Clearly, military hardware must be very reliable, and servers and automotive systems are also expected to be available constantly. Some amount of failure is inevitable, so being able to repair, avoid, or mitigate fau... » read more

Rapid Changes Add New Concerns For IC Industry


Experts at the Table: Semiconductor Engineering sat down to discuss the impact of leading edge technologies such as generative AI in data centers, AR/VR, and security architectures for connected devices, with Michael Kurniawan, business strategy manager at Accenture; Kaushal Vora, senior director and head of business acceleration and ecosystem at Renesas Electronics; Paul Karazuba, vice preside... » read more

Hidden Costs And Tradeoffs In IC Quality


Balancing reliability against cost is becoming more difficult for semiconductor test, as chip complexity increases and devices become more domain-specific. Tests need to be efficient and effective without breaking the bank, while also ensuring chips are of sufficient quality for their specific application. The problem is that every new IC device adds its own set of challenges, from smaller f... » read more

Mastering Complexity Leveraging Digital Threads For Electronics Systems Design And Manufacturing


The rapid advancement of technology and its integration into various industries, particularly the electronics sector, has led to a significant increase in complexity. Digital threads offer a seamless framework for data flow throughout a product’s lifecycle, from ideation to utilization, fostering collaboration and informed decision-making. They intersect various domains, ensuring information ... » read more

Plugging Gaps In The IC Supply Chain


Multiple touch points in manufacturing and packaging are exposing gaps in the data used to track different components, making it difficult to identify the source of issues that can affect yield and reliability, and opening the door to counterfeit or sub-standard parts. This involves more than just assigning a simple identifying code to a chip. At different points in a device's lifecycle, new... » read more

SLM Analytics Of In-Chip Monitor Data Unlock Greater Productivity And Cost Savings


When it comes to measuring key operational metrics such as power and performance of your silicon, in-chip monitors have been the longstanding cornerstone for providing such valuable measurements and insights. Data captured from these monitors – process monitors configured in the form of ring oscillator chains being the most common – can tell you if your chip is meeting the requisite power o... » read more

Ensuring The Health And Reliability Of Multi-Die Systems


From generative AI tools that rapidly produce chatbot responses to high-performance computing (HPC) applications enabling financial forecasting and weather modeling, it’s clear we’re in a whole new realm of processing power demand. Given these compute-intensive workloads, monolithic SoCs are no longer capable to meet today’s processing needs. Engineering ingenuity, however, has answered t... » read more

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