This work began in 1995 as an outgrowth of the InfoPad project which showed us that in order to reduce the energy consumption of a portable multimedia terminal that something had to be done about the consumption of the microprocessor subsystem. The design of the InfoPad attempted to reduce the requirements of this general pur pose processor by moving the computation into the network or by the use of highly optimized integrated circuits, but in spite of these efforts it still was a major consumer of energy. The reasons for this became apparent as we determined that the energy required to perform a function in dedicated hardware could be several orders of magnitude lower than that consumed in the InfoPad microprocessor. We therefore set out on a full fledged attack on all aspects of the microprocessor energy consumption [1 J. After considerable analysis it became clear that though better circuit design and a stream lined architecture would assist in our goal of energy reduction, that the biggest gains were to be found by operating at reduced voltages. For the busses and VO this could be accomplished without significant degradation of the processor performance, but this was not a straightforward solution when applied to the core of the processor sub system (CPU and memory). The basic organization of Energy Efficient Microprocessor Design is to start with a description of the metrics and benchmarks used to design energy-efficient microprocessor systems, which is followed by energy efficient methodologies for the architecture and circuit design, DC-DC conversion, energy efficient software and system integration. Detailed design of the critical circuits and their performance is included throughout. Energy Efficient Microprocessor Design will be of interest to circuit designers as well as researchers in computer architecture and signal processing. Low-Power researchers and designers will find Energy Efficient Microprocessor Design of particular interest. Front Matter....Pages i-xii Introduction....Pages 1-6 Energy Efficient Design....Pages 7-43 Microprocessor System Architecture....Pages 45-78 Circuit Design Methodology....Pages 79-124 Energy Driven Design Flow....Pages 125-167 Microprocessor and Memory IC’s....Pages 169-215 DC-DC Voltage Conversion....Pages 217-250 DC-DC Converter IC for DVS....Pages 251-282 DVS System Design and Results....Pages 283-304 Software and Operating System Support....Pages 305-350 Conclusions....Pages 351-354 Back Matter....Pages 355-357 This Volume Starts With A Description Of The Metrics And Benchmarks Used To Design Energy-efficient Microprocessor Systems, Followed By Energy-efficient Methodologies For The Architecture And Circuit Design, Dc-dc Conversion, Energy-efficient Software And System Integration.
