Paul, Raúl and I are having fun with our Innovation in Verification series, and you seem to be also, judging by the hit rates we’re getting. We track these carefully to judge what you find most interesting and what seems to fall more under the category of “Meh”. Paul and others also get informal feedback in client meetings but it would… Read More
Learning-Based Power Modeling. Innovation in Verification
Learning-Based Power Modeling. Innovation in Verification
Is it possible to automatically generate abstract power models for complex IP which can both run fast and preserve high estimation accuracy? Paul Cunningham (GM, Verification at Cadence), Raúl Camposano (Silicon Catalyst, entrepreneur, former Synopsys CTO) and… Read More
Battery Sipping HiFi DSP Offers Always-On Sensor Fusion
Earbuds are one of the fastest growing market segments, which is creating the need for audio DSPs with higher performance and a smaller energy footprint. More than just being wireless speakers – earbuds, and wearables for that matter, have become a sophisticated extension of the user interface of phones and laptops, etc.… Read More
Memory Consistency Checks at RTL. Innovation in Verification
Multicore systems working with shared memory must support a well-defined model for consistency of thread accesses to that memory. There are multiple possible consistency models. Can a design team run memory consistency checks at RTL? Paul Cunningham (GM, Verification at Cadence), Raúl Camposano (Silicon Catalyst, entrepreneur,… Read More
Cadence Reveals Front-to-Back Safety
This is another level-up story, a direction I am finding increasingly appealing. This is when a critical supplier in the electronics value chain moves beyond islands of design automation to provide an integrated solution for the front-to-back design for capabilities now essential for automotive and industrial automation … Read More
Design Planning and Optimization for 3D and 2.5D Packaging
Introduction
Frequent SemiWiki readers are aware of the growing significance of heterogeneous multi-die packaging technologies, offering a unique opportunity to optimize system-level architectures and implementations. The system performance, power dissipation, and area/volume (PPA/V) characteristics of a multi-die… Read More
An ISA-like Accelerator Abstraction. Innovation in Verification
A processor ISA provides an abstraction against which to verify an implementation. We look here at a paper extending this concept to accelerators, for verification of how these interact with processors and software. Paul Cunningham (GM, Verification at Cadence), Raúl Camposano (Silicon Catalyst, entrepreneur, former Synopsys… Read More
Accelerating Exhaustive and Complete Verification of RISC-V Processors
As processor architecture and design development becomes completely liberated with open-source RISC-V instruction set architecture (ISA), the race to get RISC-V silicon in our hands has increased massively. We have no doubt that in next 5 years, we will see RISC-V based laptops and desktops in the market. But would these processors… Read More
Side Channel Analysis at RTL. Innovation in Verification
Roots of trust can’t prevent attacks through side-channels which monitor total power consumption or execution timing. Correcting weakness to such attacks requires pre-silicon vulnerability analysis. Paul Cunningham (GM, Verification at Cadence), Raúl Camposano (Silicon Catalyst, entrepreneur, former Synopsys CTO)… Read More
Cadence Tempus Update Promises to Transform Timing Signoff User Experience
Cadence invests heavily in the development of their Tempus Timing Signoff Solution due to its importance in the SoC design flow. I recently had a discussion on the topic of the most recent Tempus update with Brandon Bautz, senior product management group director in the Digital & Signoff Group, and Hitendra Divecha, product… Read More