Product category: Design and Development Software
News Release from: Mentor Graphics UK | Subject: Precision Synthesis
Edited by the Electronicstalk Editorial Team on 7 March 2002
Platform ready for
future programmable SoCs
The Precision Synthesis environment is a synthesis platform that maximises the performance of both existing programmable logic devices and next-generation multi-million-gate field-programmable SoCs
Mentor Graphics has unveiled its Precision Synthesis environment, a synthesis platform that maximises the performance of both existing programmable logic devices (PLDs) and next-generation, multi-million-gate field-programmable system-on-chip (FPSoC) devices. Powered in part by the company's proven Exemplar technology, Precision Synthesis is the linchpin to a company-wide initiative to provide a comprehensive toolsuite, from design creation through verification and system integration, and intellectual property cores, for the broad spectrum of FPGA designs.
This article was originally published on Electronicstalk on 7 March 2002 at 8.00am (UK)
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Continued advancements in FPGA semiconductor technology, especially in the areas of high-speed design and system-level integration, drive the need for next-generation synthesis tools.
Mentor Graphics collaborated with programmable device market leaders, Altera, Lattice Semiconductor and Xilinx throughout the product development process.
The new tool delivers a scalable synthesis platform available for designers implementing a full-range of programmable logic devices, including the Stratix and Excalibur architectures from Altera and the new Virtex-II platform FPGAs by Xilinx.
"Synthesis plays a pivotal role in enabling Mentor to extend its leadership in the field programmable logic design market", said Dr Walden C Rhines, chairman of the board and chief executive officer for Mentor Graphics.
"Precision Synthesis is a rich and highly productive design environment that delivers excellent results, allowing our customers to take full advantage of next-generation programmable logic technology that industry-leading companies such as Altera, Lattice and Xilinx deliver today".
Further reading
Advanced synthesis products support latest FPGAs
Mentor Graphics Corp has announced that its suite of advanced synthesis products supports the newly introduced Virtex-5 LXT field programmable gate arrays from Xilinx
Synthesis tool helps educate FPGA designers
The Mentor Graphics Precision Synthesis tool is to be integrated into two Xilinx Education Services courses for complex FPGA designs
Tool integration makes FPGA design more flexible
The Mentor Graphics Precision Synthesis tool is tightly integrated into the latest version of the integrated software environment (ISE 7.1i) from Xilinx
The tool features an intuitive graphical user interface, a new suite of optimisation algorithms (ASE optimisation) and a state-of-the-art-timing engine (PreciseTime) that delivers the industry's most accurate timing analysis.
Precision Synthesis accelerates time to productivity for both novice and experienced programmable logic designers, equipping designers with intuitive operations that make achieving design goals easier.
At the heart of the push-button flow is the Design Centre that includes two distinct views - design view and hierarchy view.
Precision's design view allows designers to perform all operations with a click of the mouse, including adding or editing design and constraint files, or viewing synthesis and place and route report files.
The Design Centre's design view also provides revision management, enabling designers to control design iterations.
Precision's unique hierarchy view is directly linked to a schematic viewer, enabling designers to find any object in the design and apply constraints directly to the object.
This eliminates the need to launch additional design editors for entering constraints, which saves time, increases productivity and eliminates user frustration when working with large designs.
Precision Synthesis also supports Synopsys Design Constraints (SDC), ensuring compatibility with ASIC flows and easy migration of traditional ASIC IP and cores to FPGAs.
Precision Synthesis includes a suite of unique algorithms called Architecture Signature Extraction (ASE) optimisation that automatically focuses specific optimisations on areas of the design that likely hinder overall performance, such as finite state machines, crosshierarchical paths, or paths with excessive combinational logic.
ASE optimisation uses an automated, heuristic approach to deliver smaller designs that achieve project requirements in less time by reducing the manual process of isolating and correcting problem areas in a design.
ASE optimisation performs advanced technique tasks such as look-up table merging, logic tunnelling, register retiming and timing-driven I/O block mapping to reach the target performance without the need for iterative manual user intervention.
Performance increases have measured in excess of 70% on critical paths where Precision's ASE optimisation recognised and applied register retiming to a path to meet design performance goals.
In addition, ASE optimisation's FSM optimisation technology delivers a 50% performance improvement over competing synthesis solutions.
Precision Synthesis includes PreciseTime, a new incremental timing engine that provides advanced functionality previously found only in stand-alone static timing analysis tools.
PreciseTime automatically isolates critical timing path violations that can be missed by other synthesis tools.
After identifying the critical timing paths, Precision Synthesis invokes ASE optimisation to repair all marginal timing problems prior to programming the FPGA.
PreciseTime also provides advanced constraint-driven timing analysis.
With a single mouse click, users can modify design constraints on critical paths and view the results instantly, enabling designers to consider design tradeoffs that can improve performance.
Unlike other tools that require running additional synthesis iterations for design analysis, PreciseTime saves designers' time and increases their productivity prior to going to place and route.
Precision Synthesis is currently in beta release and will be available to all customers in Q2 2002.
The tool runs on Windows NT, 98, 2000 and XP, Solaris and HP-UX platforms.
Precision Synthesis will be provided as a replacement technology for LeonardoSpectrum level three customers.
For LeonardoSpectrum level one, LeonardoSpectrum level two and FPGA Advantage Personal Edition users, Mentor Graphics will continue to offer ongoing device support and continued software releases to these products, with an option to upgrade to Precision Synthesis if desired.
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