This paper describes an investigation of potential advantages and pitfalls of applying an asynchr... more This paper describes an investigation of potential advantages and pitfalls of applying an asynchronous design methodology to an advanced microprocessor architecture. A prototype complex instruction set length decoding and steering unit1 was implemented using self-timed circuits. The prototype chip was fabricated on a 0.25μ CMOS process and tested successfully. Results show significant advantages – in particular, performance of 2.5–4.5 instructions per nanosecond – with manageable risks using this design technology. The prototype achieves three times the throughput and half the latency, dissipating only half the power and requiring about the same area as the fastest commercial 400MHz clocked circuit fabricated on the same process. Keywords— Asynchronous design, instruction length decoding, relative timing, self-timed, pulsed logic, domino circuits, self-reset logic, handshake protocols, asynchronous testability, asynchronous debugging.
ABSTRACT This paper describes an investigation of potential advantages and pitfalls of applying a... more ABSTRACT This paper describes an investigation of potential advantages and pitfalls of applying an asynchronous design methodology to an advanced microprocessor architecture. A prototype complex instruction set length decoding and steering unit was implemented using self-timed circuits. [The Revolving Asynchronous Pentium Processor Instruction Decoder (RAPPID) design implemented the complete Pentium II 32-bit MMX instruction set.] The prototype chip was fabricated on a 0.25CMOS process and tested successfully. Results show significant advantages---in particular, performance of 2.5--4.5 instructions per nanosecond---with manageable risks using this design technology. The prototype achieves three times the throughput and half the latency, dissipating only half the power and requiring about the same area as the fastest commercial 400-MHz clocked circuit fabricated on the same process.
This paper describes an investigation of potential advantages and pitfalls of applying an asynchr... more This paper describes an investigation of potential advantages and pitfalls of applying an asynchronous design methodology to an advanced microprocessor architecture. A prototype complex instruction set length decoding and steering unit1 was implemented using self-timed circuits. The prototype chip was fabricated on a 0.25μ CMOS process and tested successfully. Results show significant advantages – in particular, performance of 2.5–4.5 instructions per nanosecond – with manageable risks using this design technology. The prototype achieves three times the throughput and half the latency, dissipating only half the power and requiring about the same area as the fastest commercial 400MHz clocked circuit fabricated on the same process. Keywords— Asynchronous design, instruction length decoding, relative timing, self-timed, pulsed logic, domino circuits, self-reset logic, handshake protocols, asynchronous testability, asynchronous debugging.
ABSTRACT This paper describes an investigation of potential advantages and pitfalls of applying a... more ABSTRACT This paper describes an investigation of potential advantages and pitfalls of applying an asynchronous design methodology to an advanced microprocessor architecture. A prototype complex instruction set length decoding and steering unit was implemented using self-timed circuits. [The Revolving Asynchronous Pentium Processor Instruction Decoder (RAPPID) design implemented the complete Pentium II 32-bit MMX instruction set.] The prototype chip was fabricated on a 0.25CMOS process and tested successfully. Results show significant advantages---in particular, performance of 2.5--4.5 instructions per nanosecond---with manageable risks using this design technology. The prototype achieves three times the throughput and half the latency, dissipating only half the power and requiring about the same area as the fastest commercial 400-MHz clocked circuit fabricated on the same process.
Uploads
Papers by Charles Dike