Embedded Systems Design - June 2008 - (Page 21)

Optimize Performance at the Lowest Power National’s PowerWise® Solutions Help Engineers Design Energy Efficient Systems PowerWise products are analog and mixed-signal semiconductors that balance higher performance with lower power consumption. PowerWise subsystems are architectural innovations designed to enable energy-efficient systems. Amp Power Management Interface PowerWise Metrics Help Designers Compare Analog Components PowerWise metrics are formulas and thresholds that distinguish energy efficient components from those that are less efficient. National has developed PowerWise metrics for 24 product categories and selected the best-in-class energy efficient products in each of these categories. Each PowerWise product has a PowerWise label and rating which summarizes its key specifications. PowerWise® Efficiency Ratings (4 out of 24 categories shown) Product Family Switching Regulators High-Speed ADCs PowerWise® Solutions and the Future of Energy Utilization September 2007 Richard F Zarr, National Semiconductor Metric Peak Efficiency Threshold ≥ 95 ≤ 2.5 Units % pJ/conversion P 2 ENOB Fs ch © 2008, National Semiconductor Corporation. National Semiconductor, , and PowerWise are registered trademarks. All rights reserved. Introduction The obvious advantage of lower power is higher economy (less dollars spent on energy) or longer battery life (i.e. play Today’s technological civilization is driven by energy – either Giga sample ADC, the time on a portable music player). stored or captured, it is required to run our machines. With- ADC083000 uses a novel folding A not so obvious advantage is longer service life due required converter topology out energy and the proper method to convert it into useful that greatly reduces the power to reduced heat wear on the electronics. Semiconductors less than power, much of our technological worldto sample at working. would stop 3 Giga Samples Per Second (GSPS) atfatigue in the presence of elevated temperatures. Th reduces power This 2 watts. This science o In 1908 William A. Smith stated, “Engineering is theis an architecture that greatly e lower the ambient temperature, the longer service life a product will provide. consumption over other converter architectures such as ﬂashThis can also lead to ﬂash of economy, of conserving the energy, kinetic and potential, reduced cost due to well, replacement periods. The converters. The folding architecture also scaleslongerwhere as provided and stored up by nature for the use of man. It is ﬂash to the best the business of engineering to utilize thisﬂash converters double their power consumption for every energy Figure In other cases, a new design may need to be implemented 2. WEBENCH Optimization Control advantage, so that there may be the leastbit of resolution that is added. possible waste.” with the previous resources (space, power, waste heat limits, etc). A It was noted even in the early part of theSystems Versus Components classic example could be a cable set top box (STB). 20th century that Thethe performance-to-power same or smaller than the PowerWiseSystems part physical space is either the Intellectual Property and Systems Kn driver from the family as Knowledge a not-to-distant future, streams of video t stream In it was good engineering practice to be conservative with Another important aspect of previous in looking at individual relates Semiconductor has not only in t tr with the available resources. Today, it has become a requirement. National to the ratio metric is not always apparent model, the power (which directly of the signal chain. This component been providing audio will be the normal traﬃc found waste heat) is either the same or lower, solutions for increasing Ultra-High-Speed combination with Mo ost In modern electronic design, power is a components. It is how these components enable lower power however the design ourthe performance-to-poweron thefor commodity that is performance-to ratio Internet. Most handheld portable ADC083000 data r rt record devices ﬁnite. Additionally, much of the power that runs electronics example of this isprobablyof Switcher consumption. A good requirements the use specify a higher level analog sections ofconverter but for the digital cores as will support video recording and the of performance systems, and timing solutions from the s stre playback ends up as waste heat which provides noUnit for Power Ampliﬁer (i.e.Pa classic standard deﬁnition STB now moving to HDTV PowerWise family (AVS) PowerWise as well as real time streaming useful work. Think V Ampliﬁer (SuPA) as seen in Figure 1. Fr Figure well. National’s Adaptive Voltage Scaling (A and adding DVR capability). This design change is a great starting in digital cores found in many will also require low latency and provide a chalqu o laten uire which of the engines of the internet and cellular infrastructure. A in combination with the LMV228 power Using the LM3208 solutions have been used place for engineers fo lenge the PA can be dramatically involved in designing truly a system solution that works in va ailability. y high bandwidth availability. All of these large blade server farm can house over 10,000 computers component ofin that the resources have not changed – the power andis is instrumentation. cellular handsets. Th This solu detector, the Pdc P physical space remain P rg ge features require large increases in infraeach using roughly 200 watts of power, not to mention thethese devices would qualify asthe same. If the designer is going to the processor and an external Power Mancombination with ext reduced – both of succeed, then The Future s processi structure air conditioning required to pump the waste heat for systematically reducing po higher performance components that use(PMU) such as the LP5552. The intellectual as well as local processing power. agement Unit the products out of the same or less energy will be required. ThispropertyEmail toof isFrom in the processor core monitors the performance why the performance-to-power ratio the advantage Streaming Video th r rformance-toThis is of buildings. Add the future requirements for streaming video set output stage. increasing the performance-to-power ratio. system and adaptively adjusts the supply and bias voltis so important. and the power numbers sky rocket. This pattern of increasing the a good example of why PowerWise supp For power consumption will only continue as more countries add signiﬁcantly ages to signiﬁcantlyisreduce power consump consumption in the digital energy eﬃciency important, let’s Architecture Versus Process Conclusion capability for their populations. A PowerWise pro processorthe data trend. In the early days (circa constantly follow up to 70%. AVS PowerWise products National Semiconductor has understoodadjust in real Internet provide the move small of performance forces drive the adoption of for manythe time to was used to highest level As the market e es ado le 1990), years the importance of process technology – not only for consistentemails. Emails of the day in greatly With this trend in mind, National Semiconductor has continstreaming video, instant bandwid and ns stant bandwidth, at ﬁles lowest power consumption resulting the and mostly high quality, but also for higher performance at contained text andfrom a single charge. uously developed products that provide a level of performance ca apacity, y unlimited storage capacity, the re resources char increased operating time HTTP was just only lower power. National was a pioneer with the industry’s ﬁrst CMOS be used to support HTML at reduced power consumption. This is the PowerWise® brand ll required to fuel it al remain som all somewhat beginning to operational ampliﬁer as well as the architects of Low-Voltageshrink to ever smaller geometries, static cars in the 70’s only averaged – products that have exceptional performance-to-power ratios. e ave ﬁnite. As g Asencodedprocesses digital rich content. As the World Wide Diﬀerential Signaling (LVDS) communication devices. Highovertake the dynamic power as more8-11 MPG, today’s vehicles can easily PowerWise components can be found in every National Semit vehicle about p power will beginand e-commerce began, the Web emerged to bandwidth, low leakage processes are essential to providing into a smaller space. Process reach 30 MPG on the same fuel used 30 conductor product family from op-amps to high-speed data t u transistors was packed a much larger amount engineers Internet are moving great overall performance in semiconductors. data that is includingto ﬁnd waysextreme- internalago. Additionally, muscle cars of today converters, from communication devices to power regulators. na y ally, ca are constantly c only reduce years leakﬁnd of But traﬃ struggling photos and to re half of the story. What qualiﬁes National Semiconductor’s devices to be Power0 can easily age which at larger geometries (above 90was were manage-boast 500 HP and still achieve n ly rich content. Once a simple method nm) Wise components? Let’s start by evaluating the metrics. . This i able. AVS Pcompress audio (MPEG 1 layer 3 to these prob-mileage. This is what increasing A owerWise applied reasonable found toPowerWise solutions can be app The techniques and intellectual propertylems MP3), audio was being shipped aroundincrease either that to greatly reduce the st atic power and o-power the performance to-power ratio c achieve. can or implement device designs are as important as the processes themselves. theto reduce bandwidth dissipation. gains can be made in el What is the PowerWise Brand? n The same electronic run time (batteries) or available overall power po as well, absorbing Figure 1 For example, National’s newest PowerWiseand driving consumers to ﬁnd faster ultra-high-speed n nal Semiconductor’s devices, and National Semicondu The Performance-to-Power Ratio o wi PowerWise family of products will enable Reference Designs connections to the Internet. A simple metric for http://national.com/powerwise http://national.com/powerwise http://national.com/powerwise http://national.com/powerwise

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Embedded Systems Design - June 2008

Embedded Systems Design - June 2008 Contents #Include Party Bit Programmer's Toolbox Cover Feature: Virtual Hardware Platforms for Embedded Software Validation Allocating Memory in MATLAB-to-C Code MDD and IDEs: Making the Twain Meet in Embedded Systems Design Avoid a Thrashing Guest Editor Advertising Index Break Points Marketplace

Embedded Systems Design - June 2008

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