FROM FPGA-BASED
RECONFIGURABLE SYSTEMS
TO
AUTONOMIC HETEROGENEOUS
COMPUTING SYSTEMS
DISEÑO DIGITAL EN FPGA
Switched Systems
• A switch is a digital
device that can take
one of two states:
open or closed
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Harvard Mark I
• Built by Howard Aiken in 1939.
• Used to compute ballistic tables for the U.S.
Navy.
• It was based on mechanical punch-card
tabulating devices.
• It could perform arithmetic operations,
including complex trigonometry and
logarithms
• The original computer weighed about five
tons and was 15 m long.
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ENIAC
• Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer,
built in the years 1943 to 1946.
• Designed to compute ballistic tables, but it could
be applied to a wide range of problems.
• ENIAC contained 20 electronic accumulators, (a
10-digit decimal number).
• It had a read-only memory of about 300 numbers,
which were entered by turning switches.
• An IBM card reader and an IBM cardpunch
provided input and output.
• 18,000 tubes, 70,000 resistors, 10,000 capacitors,
1500 relays, and 6000 manual switches.
• It consumed 140 kW of power and filled a room
of 6m x 12m
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The Bombe
• An electromechanical
machine designed by
Alan Turing, operated in
1940.
• It help decipher German
Enigma-machine-
encrypted secret
messages during World
War II
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Univac I
• First commercially
produced computer
(1951), brainchild of
John Mauchly and
Presper Eckert,
creators of ENIAC.
• Only deployed 46
million-dollar units.
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Technology Paradigms
• Technology progress induces paradigm shifts in computing.
• Programmable microprocessor, 8080 (1974)
Hardware-based
Software-based
Systems
computing
Software-based computing
Software-based computing
• Monolithic
• high performing
• power hungry,
• single core
Computing systems are getting…
Little…
• Computing systems are getting smaller.
• Systems composed by more than one core.
Computing systems are getting…
Little… Little + Big…
Systems in which the underlaying
computing infrastructure is embedding both
big and little cores, and maybe even more
than one for each category.
Computing systems are getting…
Little… Little + Big…
little+big and heterogeneous
• Heterogeneity is the key
• Specialized core is trending up!
• Instead of just one big, we are preferring
several smaller dedicated cores.
• More efficient architecture where
computation is going to be executed on the
most efficient element.
CUSTOM-DESIGNED LOGIC DEVICES
• Known as application-specific
integrated circuits (ASICs)
• The logic circuitry is designed fulfil
requirements, specifications and
technology to use.
• Optimized for a specific application.
• They occupy very little area, leading
to less PCB area and to some cost
savings.
• Costly and slow to design.
• The circuitry in the chip cannot be
altered once it is fabricated.
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System on Chip
In the 21st century, due to Moore's Law, the number of gates that can be
squeezed into a tiny chip area has increased to such an extent that a full
hardware-software system can be implemented on a single chip.
System on Chip
With the advent of System-on-Chip (SoC), the design of electronic consumer
products has started on an era of digital convergence, leading to the
integration of numerous applications onto a single device.
System on Chip: Example
System on Chip: Drawbacks
• High power consumption
• High design cost
• Large form factor (size, shape,
manufacturing, maintenance)
• Low mean-time between failure
• Low reliability
• Increased security risks
Adaptation is the solution…
Reconfigurable-based Computing
The advent of programmable
hardware, seen since the early
1980s, there is a new we paradigm
shift:
RECONFIGURABLE-BASED
COMPUTING.
A computing system, being able to
adapt at runtime
The rationale behind it, has been
taken from our every day life.
Reconfiguration in Everyday Life
COMPLETE STATIC RECONFIGURATION
Reconfiguration in Everyday Life
PARTIAL STATIC RECONFIGURATION
Reconfiguration in Everyday Life
PARTIAL DYMAMIC RECONFIGURATION
Reconfiguration in Everyday Life
PARTIAL DYMAMIC RECONFIGURATION
The Needs for Adaptation
Reconfiguration can be used to
bring the system back to a
known and safe state whenever
a fault is going to be detected.
The Needs for Adaptation
• Structural modifications:
• Interfaces are going to remain the same, but the internal
implementation of our system can be different.
• It can evolve to better respond to runtime needs.
The Needs for Adaptation: Example
Reconfigurable computing
• Reconfigurable logic is a special kind of
hardware circuit that can be
reconfigured, after fabrication, into
whatever logic the user desires.
• The reconfiguration process is often
simply programming some kind of
configuration memory.
• There are already mobile phones on
the market that have reconfigurable
logic embedded into the system.
• Consumer electronics have not yet
followed on this trend
Reconfigurable computing
• scientific computing
• biological computing
• artificial intelligence
• signal processing
• security computing
• control oriented design,
• To name but a frew…
FPGA
• From the mid-1980s, reconfigurable
computing has become a popular field due
to the FIELD PROGRAMMABLE GATE
ARRAY, or FPGA, technology progress.
• FPGAs, are a particular family of integrated
circuits intended for CUSTOM HARDWARE
IMPLEMENTATION.
• Capable of RECONFIGURATION FOR AN
INFINITE NUMBER OF TIMES.
• Currently FPGAS are the state of the art of
Programmable Logic Devices
Reconfigurability of an FPGA
• Reconfiguring an FPGA means changing its functionality to support a new
application.
• It is equal to have some new piece of hardware, mapped on the FPGA chip.
Reconfigurability of an FPGA
• Only a few years ago, the algorithms that could be implemented in a single
FPGA chip were fairly small:
• At the beginning of the century the largest FPGA could be programmed for
circuits of about 15 thousand logic gates at most.
• A fast 32-bit adder requires a couple of hundred gates
• Current FPGAs sizes make possible to implement more than reasonable
portions of an application in a single FPGA... well, not only portion but, in
some cases, the entire application itself.
Programmable System-on-Chip –
Hardprocessors
• Modern FPGAs are no longer just a bunch of reconfigurable
elements, they can contain:
• DSPs,
• Reconfigurable elements
• General-Purpose Processors, which can be both PHYSICAL CPUs EMBEDDED
in the FPGA fabric, or a SOFT-COREs, mapped onto a part of the FPGA.
• Examples:
• Xilinx Virtex II Pro with an embedded IBM PowerPC405
• Zynq-7000 SoC family (integrates an ARM-based processor)
• Intel Stratix-Arria 10 SoC (integrates an ARM-based processor)
• Intel Stratix-Arria V SoC (integrates an ARM-based processor)
• Microsemi Mi-V (integrates a RISC-V processor)
Programmable System-on-Chip - Softprocessors
• Xilinx provides the Microblaze and the Picoblaze
• The NIOS II processor designed by ALTERA
• The LM32 optimised for Lattice Semiconductor FPGA devices.
• RISC-V, that can be mapped to a extensive range of FPGA families and
vendors.
Programmable System-on-Chip - Architecture
Reconfigurable Computing
• It gained industrial acceptance after
the advent FPGAs in the 1980s.
• It was only recently that the
nanometer deep submicron
fabrication technology allowed a full
SoC to be implemented using
reconfigurable technology.
• A computing architecture
composed of both a general-
purpose processor and some
reconfigurable hardware logics.
Reconfigurable Computing
CUSTOM LOGIC:
computation PROCESSOR
intensive • Control the
application- tasks running in
specific the R-HW
tasks • External I/O
communications
Reconfigurable Computing
FULL CUSTOM
REC. COMPUTING
GPP COMPUTING
Reconfigurable Computing
FULL CUSTOM
REC. COMPUTING
GPP COMPUTING
