Archive for category: System-On-A-Chip and ASIC Design Blog

Embedded computing is part of our day-to-day lives through consumer electronics, mobile and industrial devices, automobiles, and many more. Embedded computing is essential to the appropriate functioning of products and applications: communication, medical, aerospace, and more.

These systems are programmed to perform specific tasks. Computing systems can be made up of hardware and software with some which are programmable while others are not. They rely on microprocessors, digital signal processors, and other purposely designed processors to work. In fact, 98% of the microprocessors manufactured today are used in embedded systems.

The most common examples of embedded computing systems are smartwatches and traffic lights. Recently, these computing systems started using system-on-chip as SOCs offer more advanced functionality and computing power compared to microprocessors.

 

Characteristics of embedded systems

Embedded computing performs a single task in a large system. It is a programmable system for a specific purpose. Below are the elements of these systems:

• Made up of hardware, software, and firmware
• Embedded on a larger system to perform a definite function
• The embedded computing system can be microprocessor-based or microcontroller-based
• Embedded systems are often used in real-time computing in the Internet of things devices
• Vary in complexity and function
• Oftentimes required to perform their function under a specific time frame for the larger system to function properly

 

The elements of embedded computing

• Hardware – the hardware components of embedded systems include microprocessors and microcontrollers. These two are very similar to each other which act as CPU which is then integrated to the memory chip and digitals signal processors.
• Software – industrial-grade microcontrollers run through a software system that requires little memory to run or control machines or devices.
• Firmware – embedded firmware is usually used in more complex systems to connect the software to the hardware. Embedded firmware applies to more complex applications and operating systems.

Embedded systems must be reliable and efficient. These are crucial characteristics as these systems cannot be programmed and accessed by users. They are time-sensitive, so the system-on-chip must work efficiently within the given time frame.

 

Different systems categories

There are multiple embedded computing categories depending on their function and use. One type of design is the standalone system. This only requires input and output lines to work. Music players are examples of a standalone system.

Then, there are real-time embedded computing systems and network embedded systems. A common example of a network embedded design is your home security system.

The last and the most popular systems are mobile embedded systems that are used in mobile devices like smartphones and tablets.

These systems are expected to rapidly grow in the coming years due to the increasing demands of applications in smart transportation, communication, drones, smart cars, smart homes, smartphones, medical equipment, video surveillance, and many more.

With embedded computing systems and integration of system-on-chip, different fields and industries can come up with new and innovative features and capabilities beyond manual work can provide.

 

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Linear MicroSystems, Inc. is proud to offer its services worldwide as well as the surrounding areas and cities around our Headquarters in Irvine, CA: Mission Viejo, Laguna Niguel, Huntington Beach, Santa Ana, Fountain Valley, Anaheim, Orange County, Fullerton, and Los Angeles.

The introduction of electronics technology greatly impacted our lives from consumer electronics, portable computers, and mobile devices. It is now part of our everyday personal and business lives due to its convenience and functionality.

Every day we see or use products that utilize electronics technology. And without these, life will never be the same. More so, transportation, wireless communication, medical equipment, mobile phones, and so much more will not exist if not because of IC (Integrated Circuit) or ASIC (Application Specific Integrated Circuit).

 

What’s the difference between the standard Integrated Circuit and ASIC chips?

Integrated Circuit is designed for general use or purpose. It is a small chip that can function as an amplifier, microprocessor, timer, or computer memory.  An Integrated Circuit is made of silicon that can store data using analog or digital technology. Standard Integrated Circuit is ideal for small series.

On the other hand, ASIC or Application Specific Integrated Circuit is a chip customized for a specific use. A modern ASIC chip contains microprocessors, RAM, ROM, memory blocks, and flash memory.

ASIC is ideally designed for a product that is intended for mass production. ASIC design can also be tailored to meet the specific requirements for a product. ASICs are immensely useful in the production of consumer electronics and products that are widely used.

 

Price structure of standard Integrated Circuit (IC) and Application Specific Integrated Circuit (ASIC)

The development cost for an ASIC chip is expensive compared to standard IC. Regular or standard Integrated Circuit price is significantly lower as many users break the Non-Recurring Engineering or NRE (which is the development cost).

 

The cost structure of standard Integrated Circuit

Phase                                               Content

Die                                                     die size

Packaging                                        type of package

Testing                                              test time

Handling                                          Quality Assurance/Control, logistics, shipment

 

Comparison between standard Integrated Circuit (IC) vs. Application Specific Integrated Circuit (ASIC)

• Time to market – ICs are ideal for fast prototyping
• NRE or Non-Recurring Expenses – introduction cost for standard Integrated Circuit applications is low
• Unit Cost – ASIC cost is low due to no redundant function
• Power Consumption – the optimal power consumption clearly goes to ASIC as it has a dedicated technology and no redundant function
• Form factor – ASIC is the winner for this component due to its power consumption and small form factor
• Production – production of standard IC is faster compared to an ASIC chip, however, when the standard component becomes obsolete, it requires a to redesign your product

 

What are the benefits of Application Specific Integrated Circuit?

• Lower power consumption
• Higher integration
• Intellectual property protection
• Higher functionality
• Smaller footprint

 

Choosing between Standard Integrated Circuit (IC) over the Application Specific Integrated Circuit (ASIC)

Choosing between the two really depends on your needs. Before you can decide which is essential to your business or product, you need to evaluate the following factors:

• Unit cost
• Time to market
• Power consumption
• Solution cost
• Scalability
• Protection
• Non-recurring expenses
• Form factor
• Control of supply chain

Finding the right solution depends on your specific project requirements. Choosing the right solution can be taken effectively by determining functionality, production time scale, and cost.

 

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Linear MicroSystems, Inc. is proud to offer its services worldwide as well as the surrounding areas and cities around our Headquarters in Irvine, CA: Mission Viejo, Laguna Niguel, Huntington Beach, Santa Ana, Fountain Valley, Anaheim, Orange County, Fullerton, and Los Angeles.

Integrated Circuit is the little black chip embedded in an electronic device. This flat black chip or commonly known as a silicon chip, or analog IC, is made of electronic components such as transistors, resistors, capacitors, and others to work together to perform a specific function.

Integrated Circuits (ICs) are vital components in telecommunications, automotive, aerospace, Internet, multi-media, and other applications in today’s modern world. Integrated Circuit designs are divided into 2 categories: analog and digital.

Digital Integrated Circuit (IC) is specifically designed to produce components like RAM and microprocessors; it is mainly for logical functions. On the other hand, Analog IC focuses on the physics of semiconductor devices.

The analog design is mainly to continuously manipulate varying electrical signals through the use of amplifiers and filters.

 

Analog IC Design

Analog ASIC design starts with product specification, circuit design and architecture, logic design, physical design, physical verification

• Specification – Analog IC specification phase involves market surveys; determining potential customers, and predict future needs. Gauging future demands will also influence how you would like to do with your ASIC, and working on the requirements for the product to appeal better to customers.
• Design and Architecture – this stage involves discussion on the pros and cons of the design including performance and functional implications, time, and cost allocation. The design and architecture phase involves technical and functional details.
• Logic design – the logical and verification phase involves the coding of the data flow of the individual functional block using Verilog, system Verilog, or VHDL. The logic design includes combination logic, sequential Elements, finite State Machines (FSMs), arithmetic Logic Blocks, data-path Design, and Analog Design.
• Physical design – this stage focuses on the backend design cycle. The phase is sub-divided into synthesis, floor planning, placement, clock tree synthesis, detail routing, physical verification.
• Synthesis translates the RTL code into standard cell gates.
• Floorplanning is when engineers follow the analog ASIC design by dividing the area into partitions. Functional blocks, pins, and ports are also integrated into the floor planning phase. The process also determines the size of the chip, wire length, and functionality. Good floor planning is essential to eliminate or at least minimize issues in the signal, routing, and total chip area.
• Placement involves the optimal placement of all standard cells in the chip.
• The clock three synthesis processes are meeting the time, power, and area requirements. This step is used to ensure that optimal clock latency is achieved while lowering power consumption.
• Detail routing is the stage involves multiple types of researches to ensure detours are minimized that can cause implications on timing. This process also ensures that Design Rule Check violations are at a minimum.
• Physical verification is all about making sure that the layout is parallel to the way it is designed to. This is also to avoid any errors before the tape out.

Analog ASIC design is complicated; and will continue to progress along with technology. Analog IC design is an integral part of today’s modern life. Life has never been the same since the invention of Integrated Circuits.

 

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Linear MicroSystems, Inc. is proud to offer its services worldwide as well as the surrounding areas and cities around our Headquarters in Irvine, CA: Mission Viejo, Laguna Niguel, Huntington Beach, Santa Ana, Fountain Valley, Anaheim, Orange County, Fullerton, and Los Angeles.

What are VLSI and its uses?

 

Very Large Scale Integration (VLSI) is the process of creating an Integrated Circuit (IC) by incorporating tens of thousands of transistors into one single chip. VLSI reduces the need for more circuits in one system, especially for complex devices. The integration of technology helped reduce the size of electronic devices without affecting efficiency.

 

VLSI technology was developed in the 1970s when cutting edge computer processor microchips were under improvement. Today, it is a widely utilized technology for microchip processors and incorporated circuits (IC). Very

Large Scale Integration was initially designed to support a huge number of transistor entryways on a microchip. These transistors are integrated and implanted inside a microchip, which significantly reduced its size yet still can hold big numbers of transistors.

 

Back in the days of the vacuum tube method, electronic devices were bulky and require more power. And due to the wastage of heat and power, efficiency is decreased. The advancement of technology and electronic devices brought forth the invention of VLSI. The method helped accommodate the growing requirements of complex designs; to fabricate all components onto a single chip.

 

VLSI design flow

There are 3 major stages in the VLSI design process; behavioral, logic circuit, and layout representations.

• Behavioral representation is the first step. The process involves identifying the functionality of the device and how it is going to communicate with the exterior. A Hardware Description Language (HDL) is used to establish the behavior of the device.
• Logic circuit representation works by using functional blocks from cell libraries to integrate the behavioral representation of the VLSI design into a logic circuit representation. Once verified, the gate-level netlist is generated to develop the design layout.
• Layout representation is the final stage which determines the placing and routing of the chips. Once arranged at their best locations, building blocks are then interconnected.

 

Uses in today’s advance word:

• Computers
• Commercial electronics
• Medicine
• Automobiles
• Digital signal processing

 

What is ASIC?

 

Application Specific Integrated Circuit (ASIC) is designed for one specific application only. It is a microchip designed to one special application like a pocket-sized computer. It is widely used in the design and manufacturing of electronic devices. Some examples of popular ASIC chip include a chip with microprocessor for cellular phones to work, a chip for a satellite, a chip for a talking toy bear, and a chip used for the voice recorder.

 

ASICs can be custom manufactured for specific client applications or pre-manufactured for a special product or application.

 

Types of ASIC chip designs

• Full custom design
• Semi-custom design
• Programmable ASIC

 

Very Large Scale Integration (VLSI) and Application Specific Integrated Circuit (ASIC)

 

So, VLSI involves the development of ASIC. For specific applications, special chips are designed which is also called Application Specific Integrated Circuit (ASIC). These specialized chips changed the way electronic devices are designed and manufactured.

 

This method is expensive, but several industries are using this technology because this can be reconfigured if needed. Using ASIC, you can map any design, develop a design that can be modified multiple times.

 

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Linear MicroSystems, Inc. is proud to offer its services worldwide as well as the surrounding areas and cities around our Headquarters in Irvine, CA: Mission Viejo, Laguna Niguel, Huntington Beach, Santa Ana, Fountain Valley, Anaheim, Orange County, Fullerton, and Los Angeles.

Have you ever wondered where the idea of the system-on-a-chip (SoC) came from? Gadgets nowadays are getting more advanced and most of them are based on SoCs. Basically, these components can be a bit hard to define.

 

 

Where SoCs Are Commonly Used

 

You will usually find SoCs in your smartphone, smart TV, tablet, and voice assistant. This includes your computer where you can see it in the hard drive, graphics cards, and network cards. The main processor chip, in many cases, an SoC with a number of CPU cores, particularly with ultra-mobile laptops. You will also find an integrated graphics processing unit in such components.

 

Other cheap single board computers are also available, including the Beagle Bone and the Raspberry Pi, most are based around a system-on-a-chip. You can only see them in devices that need SoCs.

 

 

Its Brief History

 

You may not have much information regarding the history of SoCs because most of the early developments were done in the development and research laboratories of private companies. Thus, the information has not become public because of intellectual property laws.

 

Companies developing the technology at that time called system-on-a-chip were at the cutting edge of the telecommunications industry. Moreover, these companies have been developing silicon for other companies and not for sale to design engineers.

 

Thus, the chips they have produced were using obscure codenames and part numbers not listed in catalogs that should be readily available for the public.

 

 

The SoCs in the 1970s

 

A system-on-a-chip technology was intended to provide miniaturization. It dates back to the early 1970s in the new era of the digital watch when the first LED wristwatch was announced. It took 44 logic ICs to be reduced into one chip. Some of the LED driving circuitry in that wristwatch was actually too large so that was not actually a complete system.

 

 

Development of the First SoCs in the 1980s to the 1990s

 

It was in the 1980s when the revolution of personal computing took off that caused the major developments in system-on-a-chip technology. In 1991, this technology continued to flourish with the release of the AMD286ZX/LX family of SoCs.

 

Then, the boom in the cellular phone industry has made it possible for the development of SoCs in the 1990s. At the same time, many smaller chips begin to do different peripheral functions, including audio, battery charging, keyboard, and LCD displays, among others.

 

In the late 1990s, ARM Holdings began to license its fabless processor designs to other manufacturers. The future of ARM and the mobile telecoms market is greatly accredited to the evolution of its reduced-instruction-set (RISC) CPU.

 

It was very powerful and consumes less power than its competitors. It has become ideal for the use of embedded systems as can be seen in the disk drive SoC.

 

• The early 2000s featured cheaper and smaller mobile phones
• In 2001, it was the release of the iPod that was based on the twin-core ARM SoC
• The mid-2000s was the expansion of the market in Asia
• The first iPhone was launched in 2007 that featured an SoC containing an ARM core and GPU

 

Today, the mobile phone industry has been pushing the limits of the system-on-a-chip. In fact, the SoCs gained several ARM cores, GPU cores, and RAM, as well as multimedia processing features.

 

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Linear MicroSystems, Inc. is proud to offer its services worldwide as well as the surrounding areas and cities around our Headquarters in Irvine, CA: Mission Viejo, Laguna Niguel, Huntington Beach, Santa Ana, Fountain Valley, Anaheim, Orange County, Fullerton, and Los Angeles.