Design Center

IC Design

Comprehensive coverage of the challenges IC designers face, the most significant technologies produced by providers of EDA (electronic design automation) tools and IP (intellectual property) cores, and the design methodologies other IC designers are using to become successful.
Top Story
Top Story

DDR3 SDRAM exposed: Inside a bleeding-edge, blazing-fast memory device 11/3/2008

The IC Insider reveals the densely packed real estate and impressive clock-synchronization circuitry that allow Samsung's 1-Gbit K4B1G0846D-HCF8 to achieve its 1066-Mbps data-transfer rate.

News

Researchers explore nonvolatile resistive RAM as flash replacement 11/13/2008

Researchers are leaving no stone unturned in their attempts to find an alternative nonvolatile-storage mechanism that can scale to processes smaller than 32 nm—the point at which, many fear, flash may run out of gas.

“Crystal” oscillator comes without the crystal 10/30/2008

Silicon Laboratories is offering a new class of oscillator as a frequency reference. The all-silicon Si500 series uses neither a MEMS (microelectromechanical-system) frequency system nor a crystal, but it challenges crystal oscillators in the high-volume-frequency-reference sector. After you order the compensated-LC oscillators, you receive samples within two weeks with a minimum order of 75 un...

Cadence, Tessera team to optimize illumination for 22-nm lithography 10/8/2008

Using diffraction masks in the stepper's light source to create custom illumination patterns, the companies claim a substantial opening of the process window.

TI driving development, ratification of IEEE 1149.7 embedded system standard 9/2/2008

To allow developers to easily test and debug products with complex digital circuitry, multiple CPUs and applications software in products such as mobile and handheld communication devices, Texas Instruments Inc, a key member of the IEEE working group, said today that it is spearheading the effort to ratify the IEEE 1149.7 standard, which is a new two-pin test and debug interface standard that supports half the number of pins of the IEEE 1149.1 technology.

Agilent, NVIDIA accelerate signal integrity simulations 8/27/2008

To accelerate signal integrity simulations faster than previously possible, Agilent Technologies Inc said Tuesday afternoon that it is working with Nvidia to develop a commercial software release of a GPU-enabled Advanced Design System Transient Convolution Simulator, based on Nvidia’s Compute Unified Device Architecture-based GPU.
In-Depth

Multicore: the future of SOCs? 10/30/2008

Will systems on chips follow server CPUs down the road to having many identical processor cores on a die?

A turn-off: Power management complicates life for verification engineers 10/16/2008

Advanced energy-saving techniques can cause vast difficulties in the verification process.

Lithium-ion-battery-charging IC powered by charge-transfer, control innovations 10/1/2008

The IC Insider: Reverse engineering the Maxim MAX8814ETA 28V linear lithium-ion battery-charger IC.

Silicon germanium: fast, quiet, and powerful 9/18/2008

SiGe processes can give analog-circuit designers fast, high-voltage transistors with low noise, whereas BiCMOS SiGe fits into CMOS process flows.

Handcrafted analog gets automated assist 9/4/2008

EDA tools address simulation, verification, and layout for mixed-signal designs.
Experts

Making ASICs Gel 11/18/2008

The enormous complexity possible in ASICs today has had a damping effect on design starts. Many in the industry simply can’t afford to design the chips their customers want, and that their foundries can easily fabricate. We postulate a design flow that, by focusing on identifying the customer’s behavior-level requirements and mapping them onto a proven platform, reduces design complexity and breaks the logjam in ASIC designs.

Tech innovation addresses societal, environmental challenges worldwide 11/13/2008

Intensive research and development in nanoelectronics and nanotechnology is critical for tackling societal and environmental challenges facing the world today.

Third-party IP: placement, blocks, and clocks 10/30/2008

Tapeout: Questions to ask IP providers regarding placement, rotation, embedded blocks, and clocks.

IP selection and power supplies 8/21/2008

The failure to fully embrace just one of the two competing power-analysis standards has caused confusion and uncertainty among IP users about power-strategy compatibility.

ESL: The state of the industry and what’s next? 8/19/2008

GUEST OPINION: While ESL continues to remain in its infancy, there are signs in the industry that point towards eventual mainstream usage, however the scope of what is needed has to be more inclusive of the entire system-level design and verification flow.
DesignIdeas

Save valuable picoseconds using ECL-wired OR 5/15/2008

Substituting wire-OR connections for an XOR/XNOR ECL gate allows the circuit to meet stringent timing contraints.

CPLD connects two instruments with half-duty-cycle generator 10/11/2007

A clocking circuit programmed into a CPLD generates a synchronizing pulse for a slower instrument at half the duty cycle of a faster instrument.

VHDL program enables PCI-bus-arbiter core 9/13/2007

A simple VHDL program enables microprocessors or DSPs to act as PCI-bus masters.

Use SystemVerilog for coverage metrics 3/29/2007

SystemVerilog constructs suit RTL design, high-level modeling, testbench creation, and assertion specification.
ADVERTISEMENT

Blog

Practical Chip Design

Thinking about active audio noise cancellation in SoCs

A conversation with mixed-signal chip and ASIC vendor austriamicrosystems at Electronica last week stirred up some interesting discussion about act... 

Automotive applications for Ethernet are coming

A conversation with Micrel at Electronica naturally highlighted one of their new product initiatives: Ethernet devices that have AEC-Q100 qualifica... 

Testing some limits for mixed-signal ASICs at e2v

Once upon a time Atmel, of microcontroller fame, had a really interesting mixed-signal ASIC operation in France. A couple of years ago the powers t... 




EDN Resource Center

EDN Featured Vendor

NEC Electronics America: Gate Array Resources

Find all the resources and tools you need from NEC Electronics, the number one supplier of 32-bit microcontrollers and gate arrays. With more than 5,000 device types, NEC Electronics offers innovative solutions and the support you need to make your design a success.

Order AFE5805EVM Evaluation Module for Ultrasound

| Evaluation Kit
VIEW NOW
View More
View All Resources
ADVERTISEMENT


Technology Quick Links

EDN Marketplace



©1997-2008 Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Use of this Web site is subject to its Terms of Use | Privacy Policy

Please visit these other Reed Business sites