Abstract-Applications like 4G baseband modem require single-chip implementation to meet the integration and power consumption requirements. These applications demand a high computing performance with real-time constraints, low-power consumption and low cost. With the rapid evolution of telecom standards and the increasing demand for multi-standard products, the need for flexible baseband solutions is growing. The concept of Multi-Processor System-on-Chip (MPSoC) is well adapted to enable hardware reuse between products and between multiple wireless standards in the same device. Heterogeneous architectures are well known solutions but they have limited flexibility.Based on the experience of two heterogeneous Software Defined Radio (SDR) telecom chipsets, this paper presents the homoGENEous Processor arraY (GENEPY) platform for 4G applications. This platform is built with Smart ModEm Processors (SMEP) interconnected with a Network-on-Chip. The SMEP, implemented in 65nm low-power CMOS, can perform 3.2 GMAC/s with 77 GBits/s internal bandwidth at 400MHz. Two implementations of homogeneous GENEPY are compared to a heterogeneous platform in terms of silicon area, performance and power consumption. Results show that a homogeneous approach can be more efficient and flexible than a heterogeneous approach in the context of 4G Mobile Terminals.
This paper presents the underlying methodology of Cosmos, an interactive approach for hardware/software co-design capable of handling multiprocessor systems and distributed architectures. The approach covers the co-design process through a set of user guided transformations allowing semi-automatic partitioning. The transformations are based on a powerful set of primitives for functional partitioning, structural reorganization and communication transformation. It leads to a fast transformation of a system-level specification into an architecture with a short design time and fast exploration of design space. The application of this approach is illustrated using a design example starting from a system-level specification given in SDL to a distributed hardware/software architecture described in C/VHDL. We show that the use of transformational approach allows: 1) application of the expertise of the designer during partitioning; 2) the user to understand the results of the co-design process; 3) the process to take into account partial existing solutions; 4) large design space exploration; and 5) the designer to start from a very high-level specification language of the system to be designed
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