The most obvious question here is “why do I need netlist CDC?” A lot of what you’re looking for in CDC analysis is really complex behaviors, like handshakes between different clock domains, correct gray coding in synchronizing FIFOs, eliminating quasi-static signals and the like. Deeply functional, system-level intent stuff.… Read More
The Big Three Weigh in on Emulation Best Practices
As software content increases in system-on-chip and system-in-package designs, emulation has become a critical enabling technology for the software team. This technology offers software developers the opportunity to verify their code in against a high-fidelity model of the target system that actually executes fast enough… Read More
Synopsys Presents SAT-Sweeping Enhancements for Logic Synthesis
There was a “research reviewed” panel on Thursday at DAC entitled Shortening the Wires Between High-Level Synthesis and Logic Synthesis. Chaired by Alric Althoff of Tortuga Logic, the panel explored methods to deal with wire delays in high-level synthesis and logic synthesis. The four speakers and their focus were:
- Licheng
DAC Panel – Artificial Intelligence Comes to CAD: Where’s the Data?
Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) are becoming more and more commonplace in our world. We have Siri, Alexa and Google Assistant that understand our voice commands. Vision systems that recognize objects are used for facial recognition, autonomous driving, medical, geographical and many other applications.… Read More
Hierarchical CDC analysis is possible, with the right tools
Back in my Atrenta days (before mid-2015), we were already running into a lot of very large SoC-level designs – a billion gates or more. At those sizes, full-chip verification of any kind becomes extremely challenging. Memory demand and run-times explode, and verification costs explode also since these runs require access to … Read More
What’s New in Verdi? Faster Debug
Want fast debug? Synopsys recently hosted a Webinar to show off the latest and greatest improvements to Verdi® in performance, memory demand and multi-tasking, among other areas.
Performance improvements
Taruna Reddy (PMM) and Allen Hsieh (Staff apps) presented features of the latest version, released in March – Taruna started… Read More
Design Technology Co-Optimization (DTCO) for sub-5nm Process Nodes
Summary
Design Technology Co-Optimization (DTCO) analysis was pursued for library cell PPA estimates for gate-all-around (GAA) devices and new metallurgy options. The cell design and process recommendations are a bit surprising.
Introduction
During the “golden years” of silicon technology evolution that applied Dennard… Read More
Webinar: Optimize SoC Glitch Power with Accurate Analysis from RTL to Signoff
I had the opportunity to preview an upcoming webinar from Synopsys on SoC Glitch Power – what it is and how to reduce it. There is some eye-opening information in this webinar. Glitch power is a bigger problem than you may think and Synopsys has some excellent strategies to help reduce the problem. The webinar is available via replay… Read More
The Problem with Reset Domain Crossings
Design complexities in reset, like everything else in big SoC designs, has become incredibly complex, for all sorts of reasons. Long, long ago reset was something you just did once, when you turned the power on. Turn on, then hold reset for some amount of time until everything is in a known starting state, and off you go. Nice and simple.… Read More
What’s New in CDC Analysis?
Synopsys just released a white paper, a backgrounder on CDC. You’ve read enough of what I’ve written on this topic that I don’t need to re-tread that path. However, this is tech so there’s always something new to talk about. This time I’ll cover a Synopsys survey update on numbers of clock domains in designs, also an update on ways to… Read More