CHAMELEON CHIPS

DEPARTMENT OF ELECTRONICS & COMMUNICATION

ENGINEERING

KAKINADA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGICAL

SCIENCES
SUBMITTED BY:
 CH. SITARAM P.SRI DORAYYA
P.PRASAD
REGD NO: 08JP1A0446 08JP1A0454 08JP1A0432

situ.wantsyou@gmail.com dorayyachowdary3030@gmail.com
Ph.No : 9848086456 9963030816

ABSTRACT tasks custom chips that do one or two

things spectacularly rather than lot of
Chameleon chips are chips
things averagely is used. Now using field
whose circuitry can be tailored
programmed chips we have chips that can
specifically for the problem at hand.
be rewired in an instant. Thus the benefits
Chameleon chips would be an extension
of customization can be brought to the
of what can already be done with field-
mass market.
programmable gate arrays (FPGAS). An
FPGA is covered with a grid of wires. At INTRODUCTION
each crossover, there's a switch that can Today's microprocessors sport a general-
be semipermanently opened or closed by purpose design which has its own
sending it a special signal. Usually the advantages and disadvantages.
chip must first be inserted in a little box
that sends the programming signals. But
 Adv: One chip can run a
now, labs in Europe, Japan, and the U.S.
range of programs. That's why you
are developing techniques to rewire
don't need separate computers for
FPGA-like chips anytime--and even
different jobs, such as crunching
software that can map out circuitry that's
spreadsheets or editing digital
optimized for specific problems.
photos
The chips still won't change colors.  Disadv: For any one
But they may well color the way we use application, much of the chip's
computers in years to come. It is a fusion circuitry isn't needed, and the
between custom integrated circuits and presence of those "wasted" circuits
programmable logic.in the case when we slows things down.
are doing highly performance oriented
 Suppose, instead, that the chip's computers in years to come. it is a fusion
circuits could be tailored specifically for between custom integrated circuits and
the problem at hand--say, computer-aided programmable logic.in the case when we
design--and then rewired, on the fly, are doing highly performance oriented
when you loaded a tax-preparation tasks custom chips that do one or two
program. One set of chips, little bigger things spectacularly rather than lot of
than a credit card, could do almost things averagely is used. Now using field
anything, even changing into a wireless programmed chips we have chips that can
phone. The market for such versatile be rewired in an instant. Thus the benefits
marvels would be huge, and would of customization can be brought to the
translate into lower costs for users. mass market.
So computer scientists are hatching a
CHAMELEON CHIPS
novel concept that could increase
number-crunching power--and trim costs
Highly flexible processors that
as well. Call it the chameleon chip.
can be reconfigured remotely in the field,
Chameleon chips would be an extension of
Chameleon's chips are designed to
what can already be done with field-
simplify communication system design
programmable gate arrays (FPGAS).
while delivering increased
An FPGA is covered with a grid of wires.
price/performance numbers. The
At each crossover, there's a switch that can
chameleon chip is a high bandwidth
be semipermanently opened or closed by
reconfigurable communications processor
sending it a special signal. Usually the chip
(RCP).it aims at changing a system's
must first be inserted in a little box that
design from a remote location. This will
sends the programming signals. But now,
mean more versatile handhelds.
labs in Europe, Japan, and the U.S. are
Processors operate at 24,000 16-bit
developing techniques to rewire FPGA-like
million operations per second (MOPS),
chips anytime--and even software that can
3,000 16-bit million multiply-accumulates
map out circuitry that's optimized for
per second (MMACS), and provide 50
specific problems.
channels of CDMA2000 chip-rate
The chips still won't change colors. But processing. The 0.25-micron chip, the
they may well color the way we use CS2112 is an example.
 These new chips are able to
rewire themselves on the fly to create the
exact hardware needed to run a piece of
software at the utmost speed. an example
of such kind of a chip is a chameleon
chip.this can also be called a “chip on
demand” “Reconfigurable computing
goes a step beyond programmable chips
in the matter of flexibility. It is not only
possible but relatively commonplace to
"rewrite" the silicon so that it can perform
new functions in a split second.
Reconfigurable chips are simply the
extreme end of programmability.”
The overall performance of the
ACM can surpass the DSP because the
ACM only constructs the actual hardware
needed to execute the software, whereas
DSPs and microprocessors force the
software to fit its given architecture.One
reason that this type of versatility is not
possible today is that handheld gadgets
are typically built around highly
optimized specialty chips that do one
thing really well. These chips are fast and
relatively cheap, but their circuits are
literally written in stone -- or at least in
silicon. A multipurpose gadget would
have to have many specialized chips -- a
costly and clumsy solution. Alternately,
you could use a general-purpose
microprocessor, like the one in your PC,
but that would be slow as well as
expensive. For these reasons, chip
designers are turning increasingly to
reconfigurable hardware—integrated
circuits where the architecture of the
internal logic elements can be arranged
and rearranged on the fly to fit particular
applications.
Designers of multimedia
systems face three significant challenges
in today's ultra-competitive marketplace:
Our products must do more, cost less, and
be brought to the market quicker than
ever. Though each of these goals is
individually attainable, the hat trick is
generally unachievable with traditional
design and implementation techniques.
Fortunately, some new techniques are
emerging from the study of
reconfigurable computing that make it
possible to design systems that satisfy all
three requirements simultaneously.
Although originally proposed in
the late 1960s by a researcher at UCLA,
reconfigurable computing is a relatively
new field of study. The decades-long
delay had mostly to do with a lack of
acceptable reconfigurable hardware.
 Reprogrammable logic chips like field  high-performance embedded
programmable gate arrays (FPGAs) have telecom and datacom applications
been around for many years, but these  xDSL concentrators
chips have only recently reached gate  fixed wireless local loop
densities making them suitable for high-  multichannel voice compression
end applications. (The densest of the
 multiprotocol packet and cell
current FPGAs have approximately
processing protocols
100,000 reprogrammable logic gates.)
Its advantages are
With an anticipated doubling of gate
densities every 18 months, the situation  can create customized
will only become more favorable from communications signal processors
this point forward.  increased performance and channel
count
The primary product is a groundstation
 can more quickly adapt to new
equipment for satellite communications.
requirements and standards
This application involves high-rate
 lower development costs and
communications, signal processing, and a
reduce risk.
variety of network protocols and data
formats.
FPGA

One of the most promising

approaches in the realm of reconfigurable
architecture is a technology called "field-
ADVANTAGES AND programmable gate arrays." The strategy

APPLICATIONS is to build uniform arrays of thousands of

logic elements, each of which can take on
Its applications are in, the personality of different, fundamental
components of digital circuitry; the
 data-intensive Internet
switches and wires can be reprogrammed
 DSP
to operate in any desired pattern,
 wireless basestations
effectively rewiring a chip's circuitry on
 voice compression
demand. A designer can download a new
 software-defined radio
wiring pattern and store it in the chip's speed hardware functions as fixed-
memory, where it can be easily accessed function ASICs, and—to distinguish them
when needed. from ASICs—they can be rewired and
reprogrammed at any time from a remote
Not so hard after all
location through software. Although it
Reconfigurable hardware first became
took several seconds
practical with the introduction a few years
or more to change connections in the
ago of a device called a “field-
earliest FPGAs, FPGAs today can be
programmable gate array” (FPGA) by
configured in milliseconds.Field-
Xilinx, an electronics company that is
programmable gate arrays have
now based in San Jose, California. An
historically been applied as what is called
FPGA is a chip consisting of a large
glue logic in embedded systems,
number of “logic cells”. These cells, in
connecting devices with dissimilar bus
turn, are sets of transistors wired together
architectures. They have often been used
to perform simple logical operations.
to link digital signal processors—cpus

Evolving FPGAs used for digital signal processing—to

general-purpose cpus.
FPGAs are arrays of logic
blocks that are strung together through The growth in FPGA

software commands to implement higher- technology has lifted the arrays beyond

order logic functions. Logic blocks are the simple role of providing glue logic.

similar to switches with multiple inputs With their current capabilities, they

and a single output, and are used in digital clearly now can be classed as system-

circuits to perform binary operations. level components just like cpus and

Unlike with other integrated circuits, DSPs. The largest of the FPGA devices

developers can alter both the logic made by the company with which one of

functions performed within the blocks the authors of this article is affiliated, for

and the connections between the blocks of example, has more than 150 billion

FPGAs by sending signals that have been transistors, seven times more than a

programmed in software to the chip. Pentium-class microprocessor. Given

FPGA blocks can perform the same high- today's time-to-market pressures, it is
increasingly critical that all system-level
 components be easy to integrate, The RCP platform was
especially since the phase involving the designed from the ground up to alleviate
integration of multiple technologies has this problem: first by significantly
become the most time-consuming part of exceeding the performance and channel
a product's development cycle. capacity of the fastest DSPs; second by
integrating a complete SoC subsystem,
CS2112
including an embedded microprocessor,
(a reconfigurable processor PCI core, DMA function, and high-speed
developed by chameleon systems) bus; and third by consolidating the design
and debug environment into a single
RCP architecture is designed to
platform-based design system that affords
be as flexible as an FPGA, and as easy to
the designer comprehensive visibility and
program as a digital signal processor
control.
(DSP), with real-time, visual debugging
capability. The development The Chameleon CS2112 Package is a
environment, comprising Chameleon's C- high-bandwidth, reconfigurable
SIDE software tool suite and communications processor aimed at
CT2112SDM development kit, enables
second- and third-generation
customers to develop and debug
wireless base stations
communication and signal processing
fixed point wireless local loop
systems running on the RCP. The RCP's
(WLL)
development environment helps
voice over IP
overcome a fundamental design and
DSL(digital subscriber line)
debug challenge facing communication
High end dsp operations
system designers.In order to build
sufficient performance, channel capacity, 2G-3G wireless base stations

and flexibility into their systems, today's software defined radio

designers have been forced to employ an
amalgamation of DSPs, FPGAs and
ASICs, each of which requires a unique
design and debug environment.
security processing
"Traditional solutions such as
FPGAs and DSPs lack the performance
for high-bandwidth applications, and
fixed function solutions like ASICs incur
unacceptable limits Each product in the
CS2000 family has the same fundamental
functional blocks: a 32-bit RISC
processor, a full-featured memory
controller, a PCI controller, and a
reconfigurable processing fabric, all of
which are interconnected by a high-speed
system bus. The above mentioned fabric
comprises an array of reconfigurable tiles
used to implement the desired algorithms.
Each tile contains seven 32-bit
reconfigurable datapath units, four blocks
of local store memory, two 16x24-bit
multipliers, and a control logic unit.

BASIC ARCHITECTURE

Components:

 32-bit Risc ARC processor

@125MHz
 64 bit memory controller
 32 bit PCI controller
 reconfigurable processing
fabric (RPF)
 high speed system bus
 programmable I/O (160
pins)
 DMA Subsystem
 Configuration Subsystem
More on the architecture of RPF 4 Slices • low power
with 3 Tiles in each. Each tile can be • and low cost
reconfigured at runtime
But we might be getting closer.
Tiles contain :
Now a new kind of chip may reshape the

• Datapath Units semiconductor landscape. The chip adapts

• Local Store to any programming task by effectively

Memories erasing its hardware design and

regenerating new hardware that is
• 16x24
perfectly suited to run the software at
multipliers
hand. These chips, referred to as
• Control Logic
reconfigurable processors, could tilt the
Unit
balance of power that has preserved a
A FUTURISTIC DREAM decade-long standoff between
programmable chips and hard-wired
One day, someone will make a chip
custom chips.These new chips are able to
that does everything for the ultimate
rewire themselves on the fly to create the
consumer device. The chip will be smart
exact hardware needed to run a piece of
enough to be the brains of a cell phone
software at the utmost speed.an example
that can transmit or receive calls
of such kind of a chip is a chameleon
anywhere in the world. If the reception is
chip.this can also be called a “chip on
poor, the phone will automatically adjust
demand”“Reconfigurable computing goes
so that the quality improves. At the same
a step beyond programmable chips in the
time, the device will also serve as a
matter of flexibility. It is not only possible
handheld organizer and a player for
but relatively commonplace to "rewrite"
music, videos, or games.Unfortunately,
the silicon so that it can perform new
that chip doesn't exist today.
functions in a split second.
Reconfigurable chips are simply the
It would require
extreme end of programmability.”
• flexibility
If these adaptable chips can
• high performance
reach a cost-performance parity with
hard-wired chips, customers will chuck software at the utmost speed.an example
the static hard-wired solutions. And if of such kind of a chip is a chameleon
silicon can indeed become dynamic, then chip.this can also be called a “chip on
so will the gadgets of the information age. demand”
No longer will you have to buy a camera
Reconfigurable computing goes
and a tape recorder. You could just buy
a step beyond programmable chips in the
one gadget, and then download a new
matter of flexibility. It is not only possible
function for it when you want to take
but relatively commonplace to "rewrite"
some pictures or make a recording. Just
the silicon so that it can perform new
think of the possibilities for the fickle
functions in a split second.
consumer.
Reconfigurable chips are simply the
Programmable logic chips, extreme end of programmability.” Highly
which are arrays of memory cells that can flexible processors that can be
be programmed to perform hardware reconfigured remotely in the field,
functions using software tools, are more Chameleon's chips are designed to
flexible than DSP chips but slower and simplify communication system design
more expensive For consumers, this while delivering increased
means that the day isn't far away when a price/performance numbers. The
cell phone can be used to talk, transmit chameleon chip is a high bandwidth
video images, connect to the Internet, reconfigurable communications processor
maintain a calendar, and serve as (RCP).it aims at changing a system's
entertainment during travel delays -- design from a remote location.this will
without the need to plug in adapter mean more versatile handhelds. Its
hardware applications are in, data-intensive
Internet,DSP,wireless basestations, voice
CONCLUSION compression, software-defined radio,
high-performance embedded telecom and
These new chips called
datacom applications, xDSL
chameleon chips are able to rewire
concentrators,fixed wireless local loop,
themselves on the fly to create the exact
multichannel voice compression,
hardware needed to run a piece of
multiprotocol packet and cell processing
protocols. Its advantages are that it can
create customized communications signal
processors ,it has increased performance
and channel count, and it can more
quickly adapt to new requirements and
standards and it has lower development
costs and reduce risk.

REFERENCES

BOOKS

• Wei Qin
Presentation , Oct 2000 (The part
of the presentation regarding
CS2000 is covered in this page)
• IEEE
conference on Tele-
communication, 2001.
WEBSITES

• www.chameleon

systems.com
• www.thinkdigit.co
m

• www.ieee.org

• www.entecolle
ge.com
• www.iec.org

• www.quicksilver

technologies.com