Tool measures the impact of software on power use
By Gabe Moretti -- EDN, June 10, 2004
The execution speed available in chips fabricated with the latest process technologies allows engineers to use software programs instead of dedicated hardware systems to implement many of the functions an application requires. Yet, one of the drawbacks of using software is that this approach often requires more power than an equivalent hardware implementation due to the demands of using a memory subsystem. Knowing how much power a given block of code requires is important to designers. To address these issues, a new company, PowerEscape, has introduced PowerEscape Analyzer and PowerEscape Analyzer+Cache to help system architects and software developers to estimate the amount of power software routines consume.
PowerEscape Analyzer works with any ANSI C-compliant software module compiled using GCC (Gnu C Compiler) 2.95 or higher and produces detailed reports on the memory sub-system’s memory access and energy consumption, pinpointing the source code that causes the most costly data transfers. The tool also records the source-code location at which memory use peaks, along with data structures in memory at that time. The Analyzer+Cache tool works with the Analyzer and provides simulation of L1, L2, and L3 caches in a variety of configurations.
The feedback on data-transportation bottlenecks and cache behavior aids designers in balancing the costs of developing dedicated hardware circuits with the need for shorter implementation times and system flexibility and upgradability. A one-year single-user license for PowerEscape Analyzer has a list price starting at $10,000, and the list price for the equivalent license for PowerEscape Analyzer+Cache starts at $25,000. Both products run under Linux, Solaris, Windows using Cygwin, and Apple Mac OS X.
PowerEscape, 1-360-753-5999, www.powerescape.com.
