학술논문

The design of an asynchronous TinyRISC/sup TM/ TR4101 microprocessor core
Document Type
Conference
Source
Proceedings Fourth International Symposium on Advanced Research in Asynchronous Circuits and Systems Asynchronous circuits and systems Advanced Research in Asynchronous Circuits and Systems, 1998. Proceedings. 1998 Fourth International Symposium on. :108-119 1998
Subject
Components, Circuits, Devices and Systems
Engineered Materials, Dielectrics and Plasmas
Microprocessors
Large scale integration
Logic design
Design automation
Libraries
Energy consumption
Design methodology
CMOS logic circuits
Hardware design languages
Power measurement
Language
Abstract
This paper presents the design of an asynchronous version of the TR4101 embedded microprocessor core developed by LSI Logic Inc. The asynchronous processor, called ARISC, was designed using the same CAD tools and the same standard cell library that was used to implement the TR4101. The paper reports on the design methodology, the architecture, the implementation, and the performance of the ARISC. This includes a comparison with the TR4101, and a detailed breakdown of the power consumption in the ARISC. ARISC is our first attempt at an asynchronous implementation and a number of simplifying decisions were made up front. Throughout the entire design we use four-phase handshaking in combination with a normally opaque latch controller. All logic is implemented using static logic standard cells. Despite this the ARISC performs surprisingly well: In 0.35 /spl mu/m CMOS performance is 74-123 MIPS depending on the instruction mix, and at 74 MIPS the power efficiency is 635 MIPS/Watt.