Integrated processor and programmable data path chip for reconfigurable computing
First Claim
1. An integrated circuit, comprising:
- fine-grain reconfigurable control logic having bit level oriented cells;
coarse-grain reconfigurable datapath logic having multiple bit datapath cells; and
memory means coupled to the reconfigurable control logic and the reconfigurable datapath logic for defining multiple configurations of the reconfigurable control logic and the reconfigurable datapath logic.
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Accused Products
Abstract
The present invention, generally speaking, provides a reconfigurable computing solution that offers the flexibility of software development and the performance of dedicated hardware solutions. A reconfigurable processor chip includes a standard processor, blocks of reconfigurable logic (1101, 1103), and interfaces (319a, 319b, 311) between these elements. The chip allows application code to be recompiled into a combination of software and reloadable hardware blocks using corresponding software tools. A mixture of arithmetic cells and logic cells allows for higher effective utilization of silicon than a standard interconnect. More efficient use of configuration stack memory results, since different sections of converted code require different portions of ALU functions and bus interconnect. Many types of interfaces with the embedded processor are provided, allowing for fast interface between standard processor code and configurable “hard-wired” functions.
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Citations
29 Claims
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1. An integrated circuit, comprising:
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fine-grain reconfigurable control logic having bit level oriented cells;
coarse-grain reconfigurable datapath logic having multiple bit datapath cells; and
memory means coupled to the reconfigurable control logic and the reconfigurable datapath logic for defining multiple configurations of the reconfigurable control logic and the reconfigurable datapath logic. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11)
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12. A reconfigurable computing method using an adaptive compute engine including a microprocessor, a memory, and an array of reconfigurable logic elements having fine-grain reconfigurable control logic and coarse-grain reconfigurable datapath logic, the method comprising the steps of:
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executing instructions on the microprocessor;
in response to one or more instructions, loading multiple sets of configuration data into the memory;
passing data to the coarse-grain reconfigurable datapath logic; and
passing control information to the fine-grain reconfigurable datapath logic. - View Dependent Claims (13, 14, 15)
performing at least one of loading a set of configuration data from external memory to become the effective configuration data and physically swapping a set of configuration data to cause it to become the effective configuration data; and
causing the array of reconfigurable logic element to perform data processing in accordance with the effective configuration data.
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16. An integrated circuit, comprising:
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fine-grain reconfigurable control logic;
coarse-grain reconfigurable datapath logic; and
memory means coupled to the reconfigurable control logic and the reconfigurable datapath logic for defining multiple configurations of the reconfigurable control logic and the reconfigurable datapath logic;
wherein said memory means comprises means for simultaneously addressing multiple memory locations located in different memory rows and different memory columns to write identical data into the multiple memory locations, whereby an amount of data needed to completely configure at least one of said reconfigurable control logic and said reconfigurable datapath logic is substantially reduced. - View Dependent Claims (17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25)
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26. A reconfigurable computing method using an adaptive compute engine including a microprocessor, a memory, and an array of reconfigurable logic elements, the method comprising the steps of:
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executing instructions on the microprocessor;
loading multiple sets of configuration data into memory in response to one or more instructions; and
simultaneously addressing multiple memory locations located in different memory rows and different memory columns to write identical data into the multiple memory locations, whereby an amount of data needed to completely configure the logic elements is substantially reduced. - View Dependent Claims (27, 28, 29)
performing at least one of loading a set of configuration data from external memory to become the effective configuration data and physically swapping a set of configuration data to cause it to become the effective configuration data; and
causing the array of reconfigurable logic element to perform data processing in accordance with the effective configuration data.
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Specification