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Vol. II, No. 5 BDTI's DSP Insider April 8, 2002
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This month:
*** DSP Group and Parthus Consolidate IP Businesses
*** 'C64xx Family Gets Baby Brother
*** Thanks for the Memories
*** "Impulse Response," a news analysis and opinion column written
by Jeff Bier, BDTI's General Manager, and featured in EE Times
*** Newly Revised "Processors for Communications" at EPF 2002
*** "Inside" Reports Analyze Hitachi/ST SH-4/ST40 and SH-5/ST50
*** First BDTI "Focus" Report: "FPGAs for DSP"
*** BDTIsimMark2000(TM) for the Hitachi SH-5
*** Free Processor Overviews for ARM ARM9 and ARM9E
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*** DSP Group and Parthus Consolidate IP Businesses
On Friday, April 5, DSP Group and Parthus announced the merger of DSP
Group's IP licensing business with Parthus, forming a new company,
ParthusCeva, Inc. According to the companies, ParthusCeva will be
"the leading independent provider of DSP-based IP solutions." Many
observers view the deal as another step in the inevitable
consolidation of the silicon IP business, as a large number of
competitors face a skittish market and seek ways to strengthen their
positions.
DSP Group has been the most successful licensor of DSP cores, entering
the business in 1992 and generating licensing revenue of about $21
million in 2001. Nevertheless, DSP Group's licensing revenue
comprises only about 20% of the company's total revenue, with the bulk
coming from its fabless IC business, which specializes in
application-specific standard products for telecom applications such
as cordless phones. DSP Group has been facing increasing challenges
in its attempts to grow its IP licensing business; for example, some
prominent former DSP Group licensees, such as LSI Logic and Infineon,
have turned elsewhere for their next-generation cores. At the same
time, DSP Group's long-standing plans to spin off its licensing
business via a public offering were undermined by the queasy condition
of the stock markets.
While DSP Group's licensing business has focused on cores, Parthus has
focused on "platform" IP; that is, on providing bundles of software
and hardware IP targeting specific applications, such as Bluetooth and
GPS. Parthus had a successful IPO in mid-2000, but is facing
increasingly vigorous competition--including new platform offerings
from IP giant ARM. Parthus lost $35 million on revenues of $42
million in 2001, of which $30 million came from IP licensing.
Parthus had previously developed its own DSP cores, compatible with
Motorola's DSP56xxx architectures. It appears likely that these cores
will now be set aside in favor of DSP Group's Teak, TeakLite, and Palm
cores.
The two companies presented a briefing via conference call on the
morning of April 5. A streaming media recording of the call is
available at http://www.videonewswire.com/event.asp?id=4142.
*** 'C64xx Family Gets Baby Brother
TI has taken its 'C64xx family of DSPs in a new direction with its
March introduction of the TMS3206411. Previously introduced 'C64xx
family members are among the fastest DSPs available, but they are also
among the most expensive. In contrast, the 'C6411 will emphasize
cost-efficiency over raw speed: it is projected to operate at 300 MHz
and will be priced at $39 in 10,000-unit quantities. The 'C6411 is
also expected to be more energy-efficient than existing family members
due to its unusually low core voltage of 1.0 V. According to TI, the
'C6411 will offer "more Millions of Multiply Accumulates (MMACS) per
dollar and per Watt than competing products."
An analysis of BDTI Benchmark(TM) scores shows that the 'C6411 will
offer an outstanding price/performance ratio compared to currently
shipping processors. For example, its projected price/performance
ratio is over two times better than that currently offered by the
similarly speedy 250 MHz Motorola MSC8101 (which is based on the
StarCore SC140 core). However, BDTI's analysis of forthcoming
processors shows that a 300 MHz Analog Devices ADSP-21532 will be
about 2.5 times more cost-efficient than the 'C6411, and that TI's own
200 MHz TMS320C5502 will be about 45% more cost-efficient than the
'C6411. (It should be noted, however, that the 'C6411 will be faster
and contain more on-chip memory than either the '21532 or the 'C5502.)
BDTImark2000(TM) scores for the '2153x, MSC8101, 'C55xx, and 'C64xx
are available online at http://www.BDTI.com/bdtimark/BDTImark2000.htm.
The 'C6411 will have a clearer advantage in energy efficiency if TI
meets its power consumption targets. According to BDTI's analysis,
the 'C6411 will be significantly more energy-efficient than the
'21532, the MSC8101, or the 'C5502.
Among other applications, TI is targeting the 'C6411 at consumer
electronics applications like residential media servers. In many
high-end consumer electronics applications, however, signal-processing
speed is less important than support for a particular OS and good
support for non-DSP tasks such as Web browsers and GUIs; the 'C64xx
has limited offerings in these areas. It will be interesting to see
how TI addresses the needs of this application space.
The TMS320C6411 is expected to begin sampling in September 2002. Full
production is expected in December 2002. The 300 MHz TMS320C6411 will
be priced at $39 in 10,000-unit quantities.
*** BDTI Case Study
This Month: Thanks for the Memories
Many embedded applications process data intermittently, often only in
response to user inputs and other sporadic events. In contrast, most
DSP applications read, process, and write data continuously. The
streaming nature of this data creates special challenges for DSP
applications--most notably high memory bandwidth requirements,limited
opportunities for re-use of data, and hard real-time constraints.
Because of these special demands, memory system characteristics often
have as much (or more) influence on DSP application performance and
ease-of-development as does the instruction set of the processor.
The key to meeting the tough memory requirements of a DSP application
is keeping critical code and data in high-bandwidth, low-latency
memory. Although most embedded processors contain a complement of
such memory, it is often difficult to ensure that critical code and
data reside in this memory. Size is a crucial problem: the critical
code and data in even moderately complex applications can consume
hundreds of kilobytes, yet low-cost embedded processors typically
contain only a few tens of kilobytes of fast memory.
This problem is exacerbated by the fact that many embedded processors
use cache-based memory architectures whose behavior is difficult to
predict--let alone control--when running complex software. This is
particularly true for processors that lack cache-control mechanisms
like prefetching. This lack of control makes it hard to avoid "cache
thrashing," a performance-degrading phenomenon in which instructions
and data are replaced shortly after each use and must be reloaded for
each subsequent use.
Careful layout of code and data is key to improving performance and
minimizing memory-related effects. Solutions include optimizing code
to achieve reduce code size and rescheduling memory accesses so that
the processor can continue working during a cache miss. However,
making such modifications is complex and time-consuming work,
particularly when the development tools offer little support for
memory-control features--an all-too-common case.
BDTI recently created an optimized video compression algorithm
implementation for a general-purpose processor with small instruction
and data caches. Through careful profiling and data-flow analysis,
BDTI was able to ensure that frequently used data and instruction
blocks remained in the caches, minimizing cache thrashing. In
addition, key functions were modified to reduce the number of memory
accesses required. Finally, processor stalls were minimized by
carefully overlapping memory read and write operations. These
modifications improved the application performance by more than a
factor of two over the original, cache-unfriendly code.
To find out how BDTI can help you create efficient DSP application
software for your products, please visit
http://www.BDTI.com/products/services_software.html or contact Jeremy
Giddings (giddings@BDTI.com).
*** Impulse Response, by Jeff Bier
Reinventing the Wheel
In the early days of the automotive industry, every car was a unique,
handcrafted specimen--even mundane items like pistons were
one-of-a-kind. This changed in 1908, when Cadillac disassembled three
Model K's, mixed the parts together, and then built three running cars
from the hodgepodge of parts. Today, this feat seems wholly
unremarkable--even cars as seemingly dissimilar as Fords and Jaguars
often share major components. One of the great lessons of the
20th-century automotive industry is that differences between vehicles
should exist only where they add value.
In some ways, developers of DSP systems, chips, and software are no
further along today than the auto industry was in 1908. Much of their
efforts are expended in reinventing commonplace components instead of
building features that create product differentiation and add value--
and this despite the typical constraints of short design cycles and
limited engineering resources. Why don't product developers rely more
heavily on pre-existing components? Much of the answer lies in the
difficulty of obtaining and integrating components from disparate
vendors.
Fortunately, processor vendors seem to be taking notice of this
situation. For example, Motorola and Telcordia recently announced the
availability of a "feature phone" solution that includes a processor,
voice coding and network interface software, and development support.
Similarly, Texas Instruments recently introduced its "reference
frameworks" family of production-grade software templates that provide
the basic nuts and bolts needed to integrate product-specific code
with third-party algorithms, hardware drivers, etc. These products
promise to shift development efforts from critical but non-
differentiating components like TCP/IP stacks to value-added features
like a slick user interfaces.
Perhaps the most important benefit of this "pre-packaged" approach is
that it lowers the technical barriers of entry. Suppose a company
with little DSP expertise wants to add DSP features to an existing
product. Developing this expertise in house may be prohibitively
time-consuming and expensive, making an off-the-shelf solution
extremely attractive. As DSP features are merged into an ever-growing
range of embedded applications, this scenario is likely to become
common, and processor vendors who can provide the right mix of
hardware, software, and development support stand to gain an upper
hand.
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*** Newly Revised "Processors for Communications" at EPF 2002
BDTI will present its seminar, "DSPs and Alternatives for
Communications Applications," at the Embedded Processor Forum in San
Jose on Monday, April 29. Newly updated with a wealth of recent
information, this year's seminar will cover a wide range of new
processors targeting communications applications. BDTI will explore
what communications applications demand of processors and discuss how
vendors are looking to succeed.
This year's seminar will include:
- Discussion of new processors targeting wireless terminals,
including multiprocessor platforms such as TI's OMAP and Intel's
PCA.
- Analysis of new comms-oriented FPGA platforms.
- A look at the fast-changing competitive landscape: who's coming
and who's going.
Attendees of BDTI's seminar will receive a coupon good for either
$600 off the purchase of a copy of "Buyer's Guide to DSP Processors"
or $300 off the BDTI "Inside" report of their choice.
For details, go to http://www.BDTI.com/bdti_whatsnew.html.
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*** "Inside" the Hitachi/STMicro SH-4/ST40 and SH-5/ST50
BDTI is now shipping its latest "Inside" report: "Inside the
Hitachi/STMicroelectronics SH-4/ST40 and SH-5/ST50." This report
provides in-depth DSP performance benchmarks and detailed analysis
and will satisfy systems designers and engineering professionals who
want insights into the latest designs from STMicro and Hitachi
targeting volume applications such as set-top boxes.
For excerpts from the analysis and sample benchmarks, go to
http://www.BDTI.com/products/reports_SH4_SH5.htm.
For a sample of a BDTI "Inside" report, look on BDTI's Web site at
http://www.BDTI.com/articles/info_articles.htm#summary_reports.
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*** First BDTI "Focus" Report: "FPGAs for DSP"
In the first volume of its new series of technical reports, "FPGAs
for DSP," BDTI examines FPGAs as a solution for digital signal
processing applications. In this report, BDTI evaluates new DSP
developments in FPGAs and explains why FPGAs are a practical solution
for some DSP applications. The report discusses DSP support by key
FPGA vendors and important differences between them. It also
compares the FPGA solution to mainstream DSPs, providing an answer to
the question of when to use an FPGA and when to use a DSP.
For more information on BDTI "Focus" reports, go to
http://www.BDTI.com/products/reports_focus.html.
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*** BDTIsimMark2000(TM) for the Hitachi SH-5/STMicro ST50
BDTI has released a BDTIsimMark2000 score for the Hitachi SH-5 and
STMicroelectronics ST-50. The BDTImark2000 is a summary measure of
DSP speed distilled from a suite of DSP benchmarks developed and
independently verified by BDTI.
For this score, as well as BDTImark2000 and BDTIsimMark2000 scores for
other processors, go to http://www.BDTI.com/bdtimark/BDTImark2000.htm.
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*** Free Processor Overviews for ARM ARM9 and ARM9E
BDTI has recently added processor overviews for the ARM ARM9 and
ARM9E to the "Free Info" section of its Web site. BDTI's Processor
Overviews, which are based on the expert analysis found in "Inside
the ARM ARM7, ARM9, and ARM9E," provide an executive summary of key
architectural features like the data path, address generation units,
and memory system.
These and other processor overviews are available online at
http://www.BDTI.com/procsum/index.htm.
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*** About BDTI
BDTI is an independent source for DSP technology analysis and
optimized DSP software. From rigorous technical analyses of
processors for DSP, such as the "Inside" series of processor
analyses, to highly regarded technology training classes, BDTI is the
trusted independent source for reliable information on DSP
technology.
For more information, visit our Web site at http://www.BDTI.com.
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BDTI's DSP Insider (c) 2002 Berkeley Design Technology, Inc.
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