Synopses & Reviews
Application-specific instruction set processors (ASIPs) have ahigh potential to become one of the most important building blocks offuture ASIC designs as they combine the flexibility of software withthe energy-efficiency and scalable computational performance ofdedicated hardware implementations. This book, written for both, thepracticing ASIC design engineer and the embedded software developer, provides a clear and comprehensive coverage of best-practice ASIPhard- and software design.After a brief introduction to low-power VLSI design, the design spaceof ASIP instruction set architectures (ISAs) is introduced with aspecial focus on important features for digital signal processing.Based on the degrees of freedom offered by this design space, aconsistent ASIP design flow is proposed: this design flow starts witha given application and uses incremental optimization of the ASIPhardware, of ASIP coprocessors and of the ASIP software by using atop-down approach and by applying application-specific modificationson all levels of design hierarchy. A broad range of real-world signalprocessing applications serves as vehicle to illustrate each designdecision and provides a hands-on approach to ASIP design. Finally, twocomplete case studies demonstrate the feasibility and the efficiencyof the proposed methodology and quantitatively evaluate the benefitsof ASIPs in an industrial context.
Review
From the reviews: "This book deals with the basic principles of design methodology that addresses the aspects of ASIP performance and energy optimizations. ... The chapters of the book are concise and well written. The book is timely and well organized. It clearly gives an adequate view of the currently hottest topics in ASIP design. ... The book should be of considerable interest for graduate-level students in Electrical and Computer Engineering, researchers, and specialists ... . I would certainly like to fully recommend this book ... ." (Mile Stojcev, Microelectronics Reliability, Vol. 45, 2005)
Review
From the reviews:
"This book deals with the basic principles of design methodology that addresses the aspects of ASIP performance and energy optimizations. ... The chapters of the book are concise and well written. The book is timely and well organized. It clearly gives an adequate view of the currently hottest topics in ASIP design. ... The book should be of considerable interest for graduate-level students in Electrical and Computer Engineering, researchers, and specialists ... . I would certainly like to fully recommend this book ... ." (Mile Stojcev, Microelectronics Reliability, Vol. 45, 2005)
Synopsis
After a brief introduction to low-power VLSI design, the design space of ASIP instruction set architectures (ISAs) is introduced with a special focus on important features for digital signal processing. Based on the degrees of freedom offered by this design space, a consistent ASIP design flow is proposed: this design flow starts with a given application and uses incremental optimization of the ASIP hardware, of ASIP coprocessors and of the ASIP software by using a top-down approach and by applying application-specific modifications on all levels of design hierarchy. A broad range of real-world signal processing applications serves as vehicle to illustrate each design decision and provides a hands-on approach to ASIP design. Finally, two complete case studies demonstrate the feasibility and the efficiency of the proposed methodology and quantitatively evaluate the benefits of ASIPs in an industrial context.
Table of Contents
Foreword. Acknowledgements. About the Authors.
I: Introduction.
2: Focus and Related Work. 2.1. Focus of this Work. 2.2. Previous Work. 2.3. Differences to Previous Work.
3: Efficient Low-Power Hardware Design. 3.1. Metrics of the Implementation and the Hardware Design Methodology. 3.2. Basics of Low-Energy Hardware Design. 3.3. Techniques to Reduce the Energy Consumption. 3.4. Concluding Remarks.
4: Application-Specific Processor Architectures. 4.1. Definitions of ASIP Related Terms. 4.2. ASIP Applications. 4.3. ASIP Design Space. 4.4. Critical Factors for Energy-Efficient ASIPs. 4.5. Concluding Remarks.
5: The ASIP Design Flow. 5.1. Example Applications. 5.2. Application Profiling and Partitioning. 5.3. Combined ASIP HW/SW Synthesis and Profiling. 5.4. Verification. 5.5. Concluding Remarks.
6: The ASIP Design Environment. 6.1. The LISA Language. 6.2. The LISA Design Environment. 6.3. Extensions to the LISA Design Environment. 6.4. Concluding Remarks.
7: Case Studies. 7.1. Case Study I: BVD-T Acquisition and Tracking. 7.2. Case Study II: Linear Algebra Kernels and Eigenvalue Decomposition. 7.3. Concluding Remarks.
8: Summary.
A: ASIP Development Using LISA 2.0. A.1. The LISA 2.0 Language. A.2. Design Space Exploration. A.3. Design Implementation. A.4. Software Tools Generation. A.5. System Integration. A.6.< summary.="">B: Computational Kernels. B.1. The CORDIC Algorithm. B.2. FIR Filter. B.3. The Fast Fourier Transform. B.4. Vector/Matrix Operations. B.5. Complex EVD Using a Jacobi-like Algorithm.
C: ICORE Instruction Set Architecture. C.1. Processor Resources. C.2. Pipeline Organization. C.3. Instruction Summary. C.4. Exceptions to the Hidden Pipeline Model. C.5. ICORE Memory Organization and I/O Space. C.6. Instruction Coding.
D: Different ICORE Pipeline Organizations.
E: ICORE HDL Description Templates. E.1. Generic Register File Entity. E.2. Generic Bit-Manipulation Unit.
F: Area, Power and Design Time for ICORE.
G: Acronyms.
Bibliography.