Articles – Page 167

January 19, 2016

I’ll be the first to admit that I don’t understand cricket, but I’m told that cricket matches can sometimes run for days on end, and that it’s often unclear who’s winning until, suddenly and unexpectedly, one team meets some arbitrary victory conditions and then goes home to celebrate with a few pints. The FPGA synthesis game is a lot like that. It’s a high-stakes game with vast amounts of revenue at stake, not to mention some serious technology bragging rights, but it’s never really clear who’s ahead, who’s … Read More → "FPGA Synthesis Showdown"

A Non-FinFET Path to 10 nm

GlobalFoundries’ FD-SOI Alternative

by Bryon Moyer

January 18, 2016

It was the coolest transistor development in many a year. Rather than continually squishing transistor parts closer and closer together, we flipped it to vertical and celebrated the arrival of the FinFET.

Which was great: it gave us a way to keep increasing performance in many of the applications where the value lies in the speed of the circuit. But after the initial party was over and we started picking up the pointy party hats and nursing the hangovers with massive doses of ibuprofen, we started looking at the bill. FinFET is nice, but it’s also … Read More → "A Non-FinFET Path to 10 nm"

How to Select the Right Embedded Design Software

by Kevin Morris

January 14, 2016

Regardless of your job or industry, things are moving faster than ever. With breakthroughs in technology happening on a regular basis, new competitors can disrupt and unseat established businesses that have been built over many years. This phenomenon is no different for embedded software developers. These changes are creating pressure to complete the job faster and more efficiently than ever before, while also ensuring that software is high-performance and bug-free.

In all honesty, it can be a bit overwhelming.

With demands and pressure piling up, it’s vital to have the right embedded software design … Read More → "How to Select the Right Embedded Design Software"

The Business of the Impossible

ASML’s EUV Lithography Tools Push the Boundaries of Invisible

by Jim Turley

January 13, 2016

There aren’t many industries where 15 units qualifies as “a big order.”

Battleships. Nuclear power plants. And EUV tools.

For the 14,000 employees at Dutch lithography company ASML, 15 orders for EUV tools is a big deal. Even though that number spans five years and four generations of the company’s EUV equipment, it’s still considered “volume.” Walmart they ain’t.

EUV (extreme ultraviolet) lithography is still is bit space-age and sci-fi for many chipmakers. We’ve been shining DUV (deep ultraviolet) light on our chips for quite a while now, but the limits … Read More → "The Business of the Impossible"

The Internet of Seeing Things

Is Embedded Vision the Ultimate Killer App?

by Kevin Morris

January 12, 2016

There is no question that the Internet of Things (IoT) is exploding. There are estimates that, in the near future, trillions of devices will be connected by the IoT. This could equate to hundreds or even thousands of connected devices for every single human being on Earth, all talking to each other over the largest communications infrastructure ever imagined.

But, what makes a good “thing?”

In order for a “thing” to be a useful contributing member of that internet of theirs, it needs to bring something to the party. … Read More → "The Internet of Seeing Things"

Who Owns the IoT Gateway?

The Ups and Downs of Sharing

by Bryon Moyer

January 11, 2016

We spend a lot of effort talking about Internet of Things (IoT) edge nodes. Not only do they do the real work of the IoT, they must do so within tight power and cost constraints. But Mentor Graphics recently moved the spotlight a bit to shine it on the gateway. You might think of a gateway as just another piece of hardware that does aggregation and routing, but there are some high-level policy questions that warrant consideration.

The gateway is the local box that stands between the edge nodes and the Cloud. By acting as a hub, … Read More → "Who Owns the IoT Gateway?"

What Would Spock Do?

Do the Needs of the Many Outweigh the Needs of the One?

by Jim Turley

January 6, 2016

You invent stuff. Your colleagues over there in the [fill in the blank] department invent stuff, too. Together, everyone in your company collaborates to invent stuff, which you then sell for money. Outside people seem willing to trade their money for your stuff. Everybody wins.

That’s the third-grade-level, Little Golden Book version of market dynamics and capitalism. Most of us grok the concept pretty easily. But of course, the reality is never that simple.

What if you didn’t actually invent the stuff you’re selling? What if, say, you just dug … Read More → "What Would Spock Do?"

YoT – the Year of Things

2016 is Here!

by Kevin Morris

January 5, 2016

The song has been sung, the corks popped, the celebrations made, and the consequences endured. 2015 has ended, and we have plunged headlong into 2016. Moore’s Law may have ended, but the technology landscape is no less dynamic than it has ever been. We look forward to an exciting year of innovation and celebration, controversy and confusion as the fruits of five decades of exponential progress fall from the trees into our waiting arms.

When we founded this publication back in 2003 under the “FPGA Journal” masthead, we knew that the world was in the … Read More → "YoT – the Year of Things"

A 1T (or 2T) SRAM Bit Cell

Significant Change to SRAM Economics?

by Bryon Moyer

January 4, 2016

There are few semiconductor circuits as constant as the SRAM cell. Until now.

SRAM is important because it’s our fastest-performance memory tier – and it can take up a goodly chunk of your SoC area. But it’s an expensive beast (or else we’d use even more). For as long as I can recall, the basic reference circuit of the SRAM bit has stayed the same. It costs six transistors, arranged as a couple of back-to-back inverters with cross-coupling feedback to hold the state.

EDA: Expanding or Fading?

The Nature of a Bursty Business

by Bryon Moyer

December 21, 2015

Those of you who have been with us a long time may well remember that our humble journal didn’t start out as EE Journal. In fact, it started as FPGA Journal, with founder Kevin Morris as chief editor, writer, cook, and bottle washer. A few years later, we added a new Embedded Technology Journal (whose current embodiment is ably managed by Jim Turley). Only several years after that did we take on IC design specifically, which is when yours truly joined the fray.

And then we opened our umbrella wider, covered more topics, and consolidated into … Read More → "EDA: Expanding or Fading?"