Dynamic Communication in a Coarse Grained Reconfigurable Array
Robin Panda, Scott Hauck · 2011
Coarse Grained Reconfigurable Arrays (CGRAs) are typically very efficient for a single task. However all functional units are required to perform in lock step, wasting resources and making complex programming flows difficult. Massively Parallel Processor Arrays (MPPAs) excel at executing unrelated tasks simultaneously, but limit the amount of resources dedicated to a single task. We propose an architecture with an MPPA's design flexibility and a CGRA's throughput, capable of processing and transferring data in a pre-compiled schedule, with dynamic transfers between components. Alternative interconnect strategies are compared for silicon area cost and power utilization.