Application-Specific Instruction-Set Architectures for Embedded DSP Applications
Mazen A. R. Saghir · Library and Archives Canada (Government of Canada) · 1998
Programmable digital signal processors (DSPs) are microprocessors with specialized architectural fea-tures for the efficient execution of digital signal processing algorithms at relatively low cost. These features also make DSPs difficult targets for high-level language (HLL) compilers, and require that assembly lan-guage programming be used to fully exploit their capabilities. As applications become larger and more complex, and as design cycles are required to be shorter, it is important to move towards using more HLL programming. To achieve this, more compiler-friendly DSP architectures and better DSP compiler technology are required. As DSP cores become more pervasive in embedded system-on-a-chip designs, a need is also emerging for application-specific DSP cores that can be customized to the functional, performance, and cost requirements of a target application, or group of applications. This dissertation examines the use of VLIW architectures to achieve a suitable compiler target while being able to express the forms of parallelism found in most DSP applications. Performance improvements by factors of 1.8 – 2.8 are shown to be achievable simply by using a VLIW architecture compared to more traditional architectures. A method for reducing the instruction bandwidth and storage requirements of