Timing and Signal Integrity Analysis:Required Times and Slacks

By -
Required Times and Slacks

Constraints are placed on the arrival times of signals at the primary output nodes of a circuit based on performance or speed requirements. In addition to primary output nodes, timing constraints are automatically placed on the clocked elements inside the circuit (e.g., latches, gated clocks, domino logic gates, etc.). These timing constraints check that the circuit functions correctly and at-speed. Nodes in the circuit where timing checks are imposed are called sink nodes.

Timing checks at the sink nodes inject required times on the earliest and latest signal arrival times at these nodes. Given the required times at these nodes, the required times at all other nodes in the circuit can be calculated by processing the circuit in reverse topological order considering each node only once. The late required time R(v) at a node v is the required time on the late arriving signal. In other words, it is the time by which signals are required to arrive at that node and is given by

Timing and Signal Integrity Analysis-0226

Note that the late and early slacks have been defined in such a way that a negative value denotes a constraint violation. The overall slack at a node is the smaller of the early and late slacks; that is,

Timing and Signal Integrity Analysis-0227

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

SRAM:Decoder and Word-Line Decoding Circuit [10–13].

By -
Image
Decoder and Word-Line Decoding Circuit [10–13] Two kinds of decoders are used in SRAM: the row decoder and the column decoder. Row decoders are needed to select one row of word-lines out of a set of rows in the array. A fast decoder can be implemented by using AND/NAND and OR/NOR gates. Figure 52.7 shows the schematic diagrams of static and dynamic AND gate decoders. The static NAND-type structure is chosen due to its low power consumption, that is, only the decoded row transitions. The dynamic structure is chosen due to its speed and power improvement over conventional static NAND gates. From a low-voltage operation standpoint, a dynamic NOR-base decoding would provide lower delay times through the decoder due to the limited amount of stacking of devices. Figure 52.8 shows circuit diagrams of dynamic NOR gates. The dynamic CMOS gate as shown in Figure 52.8(a) consists of input- NMOSs whose drain nodes are precharged to a high level by a PMOS when a clock signal Φ is at a low lev...
Read more

ASIC and Custom IC Cell Information Representation:GDS2

By -
Image
GDS2 The Graphical Design System (GDS) format is a binary format developed by Calma Company in 1971 to convey IC layout information between IC designers and fabricators. Calma presented GDS2 format, the improved version of GDS, in 1978. Finally in 1991, when Cadence acquired Calma, GDS2 rights were transferred to it. In the design process, after the completion of routing and placement, design rule check (DRC) and layout versus schematic (LVS) are performed to verify the final layout. Then the verified layout, dumped in a GDS2 file, is transferred to IC foundries for fabrication. GDS2 File Format GDS2 is a standard mask layout intermediate format containing a single cell or a library of cells each of which includes a number of geometrical objects such as boundaries, paths, boxes, etc. These objects correspond to different layers of a cell where each layer is specified by a layer number and data type [3]. The file format of GDS2 is in binary. A GDS2 file contains a number of variable...
Read more

Timing Description Languages:SDF

By -
Image
SDF Standard Delay Format (SDF) is an ASCII format used to convey timing information between EDA tools. SDF was first developed by Cadence in 1990. Open Verilog International (OVI) approved SDF version 2 in 1993 and SDF version 2.1 and 3 in the following years. Improving SDF version 3 features, resulted in IEEE Standard 1497 [1]. Role of SDF in Design Process SDF can be used in different levels of a design process to annotate timing specifications, including timing data and constraints. Timing constraints are used during the forward-annotation process while timing data are applied during the back-annotation process. Forward-annotation process deals with porting timing constraints to synthesis, floorplanner, layout, and routing tools to meet the required constraints. During the design process, timing data can be back-annotated to analysis tools (including simulators, static timing analysis tools, etc.) to provide more accurate timing representations. SDF Structure An SDF f...
Read more