CIMdata PLM Industry Summary Online Archive
12 January 2005
Implementation Investments
Tensilica Uses Synopsys Design Compiler FPGA TOOL To Improve Prototyping Design Flow
Tensilica, Inc., a supplier of configurable and extensible microprocessor cores, announced that it has based its FPGA prototyping design flow on the Design Compiler FPGA (DC FPGA) tool from Synopsys, Inc. Only DC FPGA supports key design elements of the Tensilica processor. When designers of Tensilica's Xtensa configurable processors want to create an FPGA-based prototype of a system on chip (SoC) that incorporates one or more Xtensa processors before committing to final silicon, Tensilica's patented Xtensa Processor Generator uses the DC FPGA tool to generate an optimized FPGA netlist.
"The DC FPGA tool is the only FPGA synthesis solution that supports key design elements of our Xtensa LX processor, including fine-grain clock gating," stated Ashish Dixit, vice president of Engineering for Tensilica. "Design teams that use Tensilica's Xtensa LX processor and DC FPGA achieve better quality-of-results, faster time to prototype and lower prototype costs."
Since designers can extensively customize Xtensa processors, many design teams download different configurations into FPGA-based emulation platforms to test the complete SoC including the custom-configured processor. The Xtensa Processor Generator uses the DC FPGA tool to deliver optimized versions of these customized configurations as pre-verified FPGA netlists.
Highly efficient implementations and maximum system performance are obtained by taking advantage of the unique fine-grain clock gating transformations and register retiming capabilities in the DC FPGA tool. The fine-grain clock gating transformations map complex register control logic into a highly efficient implementation tailored to the specific FPGA device to be used as the prototype. The register retiming relies on the DC FPGA tool to insert registers in complex multi-cycle logic to maximize system performance.
"Tensilica has discovered the value of applying the Design Compiler compatible flow for prototyping ASICs on FPGAs," said Michael Jackson, vice president of Engineering, ASIC and FPGA Synthesis, at Synopsys. "Use of Design Compiler FPGA to prototype customized Xtensa processors allows designers to evaluate a broad range of implementations before selecting the one for their ASIC, leading to products that more closely meet their cost, functionality, and performance goals."
Tensilica was founded in July 1997 to address the growing need for optimized, application-specific microprocessor solutions in high-volume embedded applications. With a configurable and extensible microprocessor core called Xtensa, Tensilica is the only company that has automated and patented the time-consuming process of generating a customized microprocessor core along with a complete software development tool environment, producing new configurations in a matter of hours. For more information, visit http://www.tensilica.com .
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