Voltage island aware floorplanning for power and timing optimization

Power consumption is a crucial concern in nanometer chip design. Researchers have shown that multiple supply voltage (MSV) is an effective method for power consumption reduction. The underlying idea behind MSV is the trade-off between power saving and performance. In this paper, we present an effective voltage assignment technique based on dynamic programming. Given a netlist without reconvergent fanouts, the dynamic programming can guarantee an optimal solution for the voltage assignment. We then generate a level shifter for each net that connects two blocks in different voltage domains, and perform power-network aware floorplanning for the MSV design. Experimental results show that our floorplanner is very effective in optimizing power consumption under timing constraints.

• Type: Conference
• Year: 2006
• Where: ICCAD
• Authors: Wan-Ping Lee, Hung-Yi Liu, Yao-Wen Chang
• Keywords: Hardware, ICCAD 2006, Power Consumption, Power Consumption Reduction, Voltage Assignment Technique