ECE 425 - VLSI Circuit Design

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ECE 425 - VLSI Circuit Design

• Lecture 6 - ASIC Design
• September 9, 2002

Prof. John NestorECE DepartmentLafayette
CollegeEaston, Pennsylvania 18042nestorj_at_lafayet
te.edu
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Announcements

• Homework due Friday 2/18
• 2-2, 2-5, 2-6, 2-7, 2-8, 2-9, 2-12, 2-13, 2-20
• Problem 2-13 hints
• Assume VDD / p-transistors in top half,
• Gnd / n-transistors in bottom half
• Entrance Exam due Friday 2/18
• Reading
• Wolf 2.1-2.6, 3.1-3.4
• Engineering Recruiting Day Fri. 4/1 in
  Philadelphia
• Submit resumes to Career Services by Feburary 25

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Where we are...

• Last Time
• Layout
• Scaling
• Today
• The ITRS Roadmap
• Overview of Layout-Level Tools
• ASIC Design

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Predicting future scaling - the ITRS

• ITRS International Technology Roadmap for
  Semiconductors
• Sponsored by Semiconductor Industry Association
• Goal Forecast challenges in coming technology
  nodes
• Overview WH Table 4.17

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Review VLSI Levels of Abstraction
Specification (what the chip does, inputs/outputs)
Architecture major resources, connections
Register-Transfer logic blocks, FSMs, connections
Logic gates, flip-flops, latches, connections
Circuit transistors, parasitics, connections
Layout mask layers, polygons
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Levels of Abstraction - Perspective

• Right now, were focusing on the low level
• Circuit level - transistors, wires, parasitics
• Layout level - mask objects
• Well work upward to higher levels
• Logic level - individual gates, latches,
  flip-flops
• Register- transfer level
• Behavior level - specifications

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The Challenge of Design

• Start higher level (specification)
• Finish lower level (implementation)
• Must meet design criteria and constraints
• Design time - how long did it take to ship a
  product?
• Performance - how fast is the clock?
• Cost - NRE unit cost
• doing this successfully requires verification!

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Layout-Level Design Tools

• Design Tools
• Schematic Editor (SUE)
• Layout Editor (MAGIC)
• Analysis Verification Tools
• Circuit Extractor (MAGIC)
• Circuit Simulator (Spice)
• Timing Simulator (IRSIM)
• Timing Analyzer
• Layout vs. Schematic (LVS) Equivalence Checker
  (gemini)

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CAD Tool Survey Layout Design

• Layout Editors
• Design Rule Checkers (DRC)
• Circuit Extractors
• Layout vs. Schematic (LVS) Comparators
• Automatic Layout Tools
• Layout Generators
• ASIC Place/Route for Standard Cells, Gate Arrays

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Layout Editors

• Goal produce mask patterns for fabrication
• Grid type
• Absolute grid (MAX, LASI, LEdit, Mentor
  ICStation, other commercial tools)
• Magic lambda-based grid - easier to learn, but
  less powerful
• Mask description
• Absolute mask (one layer for each mask)
• Magic symbolic masks (layers combine to generate
  actual mask patterns)

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Design Rule Checkers

• Goal identify design rule violations
• Often a separate tool (built in to Magic)
• General approach scanline algorithm
• Computationally intensive, especially for large
  chips

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Circuit Extractors

• Goal extract netlist of equivalent circuit
• Identify active components
• Identify parasitic components
• Capacitors
• Resistors

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Layout Versus Schematic (LVS)

• Goal Compare layout, schematic netlists
• Compare transistors, connections (ignore
  parasitics)
• Issue error if two netlists are not equivalent
• Important for large designs

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Automatic Layout Tools

• Layout Generators - produce cell from spec.
• Simple Procedural specification of layout (see
  book Fig. 2-35, p. 100)
• Complex Netlist - places wires individual
  transistors
• Common generators
• Memory (RAM/ROM)
• Structured Logic (PLA)
• ASIC - Place, route modules with fixed shape
• Standard Cells - use predefined cells as "cookie
  cutters"
• Gate Arrays - configurable pre-manufactured gates
  (only change metal masks)
• FPGAs - electrically configurable array of gates

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ASICs - Application-Specific ICs

• Standard Cells
• Gate Arrays
• Field-Programmable Gate Arrays

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Standard Cells

• All cells a fixed height (variable width)
• Provide Vdd, Gnd to lines to connect by abutment,
  overlap
• Cells placed in rows by placement program
• Cells connected in channels by channel router

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Standard Cell Layout

• Multiple metal layers allow over-the-cell routing
• Channels shrink or vanish in this case

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Standard Cell Detail
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Gate Arrays

• Completed array of gates without final metal
• Metal specified by CAD Tools
• Tradeoffs vs standard cells
• faster turnaround
• lower NRE (non-recurring engineering) cost
• higher unit cost

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Field-Programmable Gate Arrays (FPGAs)

• Fixed array of gates
• Electrically programmable interconnect
• Tradeoffs very low NRE, high unit cost

CLB
CLB
CLB
CLB
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ASIC Tradeoffs
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ASIC Economics

• Non-recurring Engineering (NRE) cost - up-front
  cost of setting up manufacturing
• Unit cost - cost of each chip once production
  begins

Total Cost
Volume
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ASIC Trends - FPGAs vs. ASICs

• Standard cell NRE costs are rising rapidly
• FPGAs improving in size, performance, cost
• Will FPGAs supplant ASICs?

FPGA(current)
Total Cost
Volume
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ASIC Trends - Perspectives

• The ASIC has been declared dead
• Rationale NRE costs are high, FPGAs more
  cost-effective in all but high-volume cases
• This argument is very popular with FPGA vendors
• But, reports may be exaggerated!
• Many chips still designed with standard cells
• Current trend ASICs with IP blocks
• Current trend structured ASICs

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Design with Intellectual Property (IP)

• Key Idea re-use predesigned components
• Hard IP - predesigned layout in a specific
  technology
• Standard Cells
• Processor Cores
• Memory Cores
• Soft IP - synthesizeable HDL
• Proprietary algorithms (e.g. MPEG
  encoding/decoding)

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Structured ASICs

• Key idea provide a platform with many (but not
  all) functions for a common application
• Network/Telecomm microprocessor, DSP,
  serializer/deserializer
• Embedded Systems microcontroller, smart timer,
  other peripherals
• Allow user to customize part of design to add
  secret sauce
• FPGA Fabric - program in field
• Gate Array or Gate Array Like - customize with
  metal layers only
• Important benefit lower NRE costs

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Structured ASIC eaxmple

• LSI Logic RapidChip Platform (EE Times 9/9/02)
• Application-specific hard IP on pre-designed,
  pre-manufactured chip
• Logic added by adding metal layers to
  customize(maybe gate arrays arent dead after
  all?)

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About Lab 4

• Extraction using Magic
• Simulation with IRSIM
• Switch-Level Simulator
• RC (t) timing model
• LVS using gemini

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Lab 4 - Extraction

• in magic - extract creates filename.ext
• in shell - ext2sim filename creates filename.sim

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Lab 4 - Simulation using IRSIM

• Starting IRSIM
• in shell - irsim ami.prm filename.sim
• Node values in simulation 0, 1, X, ...
• Some important commands
• analyzer net1 net2 trace signals in waveform
• h net set net to logic H
• l net set net to logic L
• vector vname net1 net2 group nets into bus
• set vname 001 set bus to value
• s time step simulation - time ns
• _at_ filename include command file
• q quit simulation

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Lab 4 - LVS using Gemini

• Starting IRSIM
• in shell - gemini file1.sim file2.sim
• Where to get the files?
• file1.sim - generated by Sue sim it
• file2.sim - generated by extract, ext2sim

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Coming Up

• Combinational Logic Design
• Gate Design Layout
• Delay
• Noise Margin
• Power Consumption
• A Mixed-Signal Digression D/A Converters