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Embedded Signal Processing Capabilities of the LatticeECP3 sysDSP Block

Enhanced DSP Capabilities

The success of the LatticeECP2M family in addressing the 2G/3G wireless arena, coupled with discussions with customers, has served to drive the architectural improvements made in the LatticeECP3 DSP block. Several key points have been addressed. First and foremost, backward compatibility has been maintained with the current LatticeECP2/M DSP. There is also finer control of … Read More → "Embedded Signal Processing Capabilities of the LatticeECP3 sysDSP Block"

The Death of the Trade Press

Obsolescence is a familiar and friendly concept to engineers.  In fact, it is our job.  We are professional creators of obsolescence.  Each day, we go to work with the goal of making some previous work of engineering obsolete.  Our revised rodent retention device must surpass, supersede and exceed all previous versions, else we have failed.

Audio Cassettes – gone.  Rotary-dial telephones – expurgated, and not a moment too soon.  Typewriters, cathode ray tubes, mimeograph machines – all banished to the backwaters of vintage-retro curiosity by our hard-working, innovation-happy profession.  

Occasionally, however, … Read More → "The Death of the Trade Press"

A World Of Their Own

They were your typical pack of teenage kids. By turns rough-and-tumble and vulnerable. On top of the world while at the same time knocked about by forces they didn’t understand or couldn’t control. Watching them on the beach that Saturday, they could have been any kids anywhere in the world. They’d fight, they’d squabble, they’d play, they’d slap each other’s backs, they’d even undulge the slightest hint of a hug. They competed with each other and yet they were the best of … Read More → "A World Of Their Own"

ARM’s Race Escalates with Cortex-A9

In military parlance, an Osprey is a propeller-driven airplane that takes off and lands vertically, like a helicopter. The Osprey tilts its wings 90 degrees, the props pull it straight up, and the wings flip back again for conventional flight. Clever engineering, but a bit ungainly to look at.

Over in the less dangerous but equally contentious microprocessor world, ARM has also hatched its own Osprey, this one officially named the ARM Cortex-A9. The new A9 will be capable of 2-GHz clock rates, an unheard-of speed for an ARM core. The previous-generation A8 was barely able to … Read More → "ARM’s Race Escalates with Cortex-A9"

Universities and Electronics

When the first semiconductors were created, they were the result of theoretical studies. As integration grew, so the device manufacturers and the equipment manufacturers pragmatically pushed ahead with brute force, scaling as they pushed down the Moore’s Law curve. Universities often struggled to keep abreast of developments, although, for a long way down the scaling curve, the mainstream underlying theories were pretty well understood.

Today we can no longer rely on scaling alone. Small channel effects, themselves difficult to understand and predict, are worked around by using double gates, raised sources and drains, surround gates, and … Read More → "Universities and Electronics"

AV Done Right. Finally.

We’ve all experienced it.  

The SPDIF output on device A doesn’t match with the analog line inputs on pre-amp B, which don’t synchronize with the VGA-to-composite-to-component de-interlacing, re-sampling, trans-formatter box connected to the monitor from the output device, which now really wants HDMI from your 1968 turntable.  The problem of non-standard, proprietary, incompatible, poor-performing interfaces has dogged audio-visual equipment for decades, and most of us have a giant rat’s nest of cabling tucked behind some piece of furniture in our house to prove it.

In the modern era, when … Read More → "AV Done Right. Finally."

New Chips Don’t Suck (Power)

Within a week, Intel and Freescale both announced new high-end embedded processors. They’re both packed with multicore processors, DRAM controllers, and PCI Express interfaces. But, for all their similarities, they couldn’t be more different.

In this corner, we have Freescale’s new P1022, the sixth member of the QorIQ family. And in this corner, we have “Jasper Forest,” a mostly new family of chips from Intel. Both are more power-efficient than their predecessors, though, in one case, that’s not saying much. And both are well-supported with software … Read More → "New Chips Don’t Suck (Power)"

Your Boss’s Birthday Present

Flexible, powerful, and misunderstood, FPGAs are an admittedly enigmatic technology. Like the proverbial elephant amidst the blind men, the topic of FPGAs can produce a different view from every perspective – technology, applications, design tools, business… Sit down with a non-peer to have a conversation about FPGAs and you may end up wishing you were discussing something a little less controversial – like healthcare in the United States, perhaps.

Because of their inherent flexibility, FPGAs address a wide variety of problems in a number of different markets and application areas.  In each of those areas, each FPGA vendor … Read More → "Your Boss’s Birthday Present"

Small Form Factor Boards and COM

Do you know your Micro-ATX from your COM Micro? Or your Qseven from your XTX? The small form factor arena is one of those areas where it is very easy to get lost in the jargon, and, unless you are an enthusiast (and, if you are, then please forgive me), it can be very hard to get excited.

There are at least 150 different sizes and shapes for small form factor boards, according to expert (and enthusiast) Hermann Strass. And there seem to be almost as many organisations working in the area. As well as organisations like … Read More → "Small Form Factor Boards and COM"

Attack of the Merger Machine

I lost money on the stock market again this week.

The companies in question are ARC International and Virage Logic, both purveyors of silicon IP. That is to say, they don’t make anything, but they do help IC designers make stuff. [Full disclosure: the author was Vice President of Marketing and Technology Strategy for ARC International from 1999 through 2001.] The acquisition is a good thing for the industry and for IC designers (shareholders notwithstanding) and highlights a couple of big trends in this business.

Read More → "Attack of the Merger Machine"

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