Out in Front: August 15, 1996

By combining a KO microcontroller core, standard macro cells, programmable logic, and programmable interconnections, NEC has created a tool suited to developing systems around a core-based ASIC. The tool is part of the company's KO Integrated Development Environment (KO-IDE) system, which also includes in-circuit-emulator capabilities. The system, jointly developed by NEC and Microsystem Synthesis, costs $16,000 per seat.

The KO-IDE system acts as both a hardware emulator and a software debugger. The system uses 30,000 gates of programmable logic to capture part of the user's ASIC design. Programmable interconnections between IC-level versions of NEC's KO microcontroller and its standard peripherals allow the system to emulate the ASIC's core CPU. Together, the two sets of circuits provide the logic to emulate an entire core-based ASIC. The system configures its programmable elements based on a Verilog or VHDL description of the design.

The system also includes a set of software-development tools, in-cluding source-level debugging. Further, it monitors data passing through the programmable interconnections at each clock cycle. This monitoring allows the system to act as a 256-channel logic analyzer with a 65,536-sample-deep memory. As a final bonus, the system automatically generates the test vectors for the ASIC, once you finish validating the design.

—by Richard A Quinnell

NEC Electronics Inc, Mountain View, CA. (800) 366-9782.

Microsystem Synthesis Inc, Westborough, MA. (508) 870-0840.