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Multiple Drive Strength Inverters - iv1v0x05, iv1v0x1, iv1v0x3, iv1v0x4, iv1v0x6, iv1v0x8, iv1v0x12

  
gate count               1352
number of cells           668
number of library cells    28
number of used cells       18
max fanin                  17
max input capacitance     211
max internal fanout        34
critical path  0fF       2754
critical path  6fF       3948
  

Inverters with a range of drive strengths are added. LOON switches twelve inverters to a higher drive strength with a 0.9% speed improvement at the cost of a 0.7% area increase.

iv1v0x2  71
iv1v0x3   9
iv1v0x12  3

The inverter drive strength used by BOOG is x2, and we can see that no weaker drive strengths are subsequently chosen by LOON, indicating that the LOON synthesis more easily can buffer up than buffer down in order to improve speed. The critical path has changed, since the inverter at the start of the previous critical path has now been buffered up to an iv1v0x12.

When we look at the critical path, the cells with the largest delays have a drive strength of x1 with a fanout of 3 or 4. Probably the speed can be improved if these functions were available with a stronger drive strength. This would also allow the inverters between the oai21 cells in the critical path to be buffered up. In this experiment, an inverter drive strength of x2 is the quickest because of the limited drive of the preceeding oai21v0x1 cells.

               fanout         -- delay--
    y 1          16                  200
 1  aoi22v0x1     1  b2->z     302   102
 2  oai21v0x1     4  a2->z     551   249
 3  iv1v0x3       1  a->z      600    49
 4  oai21v0x1     4  a2->z     849   249
 5  iv1v0x3       1  a->z      898    49
 6  oai21v0x1     4  a2->z    1147   249
 7  iv1v0x3       1  a->z     1196    49
 8  oai21v0x1     4  a2->z    1437   241
 9  iv1v0x3       1  a->z     1486    49
10  oai21v0x1     4  a2->z    1720   234
11  iv1v0x3       1  a->z     1769    49
12  oai21v0x1     4  a2->z    2003   234
13  iv1v0x3       1  a->z     2052    49
14  oai21v0x1     5  a2->z    2334   282
15  xnr2v0x1      1  b->z     2437   103
16  cgi2v0x1      3  c->z     2620   183
17  iv1v0x3       2  a->z     2682    62
18  iv1v0x2       1  a->z     2741    59
19  nd2v0x2       1  b->z     2801    60
20  oai21v0x1     3  b->z     2975   174
21  xnr2v0x1      1  b->z     3077   102
22  cgi2v0x1      2  c->z     3228   151
23  iv1v0x3       1  a->z     3276    48
24  cgi2v0x1      2  c->z     3408   132
25  an2v0x2       2  b->z     3532   124
26  an2v0x2       2  b->z     3659   127
27  nd2v0x2       1  b->z     3728    69
28  xnr2v0x1      0  b->z     3948   220
    r 15

Table of synthesis results  
  critical path (ps) gate count cell count porosity library cells used cells
synthesis 1 4279 1561 923 43%  9  8 basic inverters, NAND & NOR gates
synthesis 2 4236 1472 792 45% 15 12 AND & OR gates
synthesis 3 4157 1357 696 46% 19 16 AOI & OAI gates, 2/1 and 2/2
synthesis 4 4157 1357 696 46% 20 16 mxi2 2-way inverting mux
synthesis 5 3983 1343 668 48% 21 16 cgi2 carry generator inverting
synthesis 6 3948 1352 668 48% 28 18 inverters with multiple drive strengths
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