Power management techniques for control-flow intensive designs

ABSTRACT

This paper presents a low-overhead controller-based powermanagement technique that re-specifies control signals to reconfigureexisting multiplexer networks and functional units to minimizeunnecessary activity. We demonstrate that conventional powermanagement techniques may often not be suited to control-flowintensive designs, and provide a comprehensive analysis of thepotential negative effects of power management on circuit delay,glitching activity at control and data path signals, and formationof false combinational cycles. We present techniques to performpower management through controller re-specification while avoidingthe above negative effects, and demonstrate the efficiency ofthe techniques through experiments.

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INDEX TERMS

Primary Classification:
  C. Computer Systems Organization

Additional Classification:
  B. Hardware
  B.4 INPUT/OUTPUT AND DATA COMMUNICATIONS
      B.4.2 Input/Output Devices
          Subjects: Channels and controllers
  B.7 INTEGRATED CIRCUITS
      B.7.1 Types and Design Styles
          Subjects: Memory technologies

  G. Mathematics of Computing
  G.4 MATHEMATICAL SOFTWARE
      Subjects: Algorithm design and analysis

General Terms:
Algorithms, Design, Measurement, Performance, Reliability, Theory