Power-supply design becomes complicated when you’re faced with multiple conflicting specifications. One example is the design of a double-data-rate (DDR) memory supply for an automotive environment.

The most basic diagrams depicting non-isolated DC-DC converters generally show two ideal switches and an energy storage inductor. In early designs, it was quickly realized that one switch could be ...

The synchronous vs. asynchronous design debate erupts every now and then, usually when a vocal minority swears by asynchronous design, often claiming that asynchronous design delivers higher ...

Lack of coordination between asynchronous resets and synchronous logic clocks leads to intermittent failures on power up. In this series of articles, we discuss the requirements and challenges of ...

In an era when power has become a fundamental design constraint, questions persist about whether asynchronous logic has a role to play. It is a design style said to have significant benefits and yet ...

As system-on-chip (SoC) designs grow larger, designers must grapple with serious global timing problems, the effect of wire loading and timing delays and the performance hit associated with supporting ...

Non-mainstream technologies can offer advantages over more commonly used approaches, but usually at some additional cost (otherwise they’d probably be mainstream). The additional cost could be in ...

Computer architecture researchers evaluate key areas such as pipelining, organization, instruction issue, branching, and exception handling when considering asynchronous and synchronous design and ...