Embedded Processor Watch

Editor: Tom Halfhill

In This Issue:

• "Book E" Revamps PowerPC Architecture
• Industry Resources: IP Integration and Design Reuse
• Industry Resources: Cahners MDR Dinner Meeting
• New Embedded IC Announcements

"Book E" Revamps PowerPC Architecture

Showing some sign of improved relations, IBM and Motorola have developed a new version of the PowerPC instruction-set architecture, code-named Book E. At the recent Embedded Processor Forum, IBM chip architect Tom Sartorius said the new architecture will allow PowerPC chips to better meet the needs of embedded markets while retaining backward compatibility with existing 32-bit user-mode PowerPC applications. With this move, PowerPC officially joins the ranks of other RISC processors seeking shelter in the embedded market, safe for now from their omnipotent competitor, Intel.

Book E offers enhanced 64-bit addressing, simplified memory management, and an interrupt structure suitable for real-time applications. Many of the changes from the original PowerPC architecture were made to give the companies more freedom to customize their processors, a critical requirement for embedded markets. Unlike the original PowerPC architecture, the new architecture will be freely licensable and sublicensable by either company.

The Book E 64-bit design, although conceptually simple, requires 94 more instructions than the original design: 124 new instructions were added; 30 were eliminated. To accommodate the new instructions within the opcode space, Book E sacrifices four bits of displacement in its extended load and store instructions. Sartorius says most displacements are smaller than 2K anyway, so he expects little performance loss.

Book E appears to be motivated by legal and business considerations as well as technical ones. The original PowerPC contracts overly constrained the two companies. Unable to agree on a common direction and not free to mutate PowerPC into the different forms each company needed, the partnership unraveled. By creating a new architecture, the companies have escaped the legal contracts governing their actions with respect to the original PowerPC. Under those agreements, for example, the name "PowerPC" was owned by IBM, preventing Motorola from licensing it to others. Under the Book E agreements, Motorola has gained these rights -- a benefit as significant as any technical improvement. -- K.D. (The full version of this article appears in the May 10 issue of Microprocessor Report.)

Industry Resources: IP Integration and Design Reuse

A seminar entitled "Managing the Shift Toward Design Reuse" is being sponsored by Qualis, Cadence Design Systems, and Synchronicity at the Fairmont Hotel in San Jose, California, on June 15. There will be presentations on integrating intellectual property (IP) into system-on-a-chip designs and on other IP-related topics. For more information, go to http://www.qualis.com/.

Industry Resources: Cahners MDR Dinner Meeting

If you're interested in PC processors, you won't want to miss the upcoming dinner meeting and seminars sponsored by Cahners MicroDesign Resources. At the dinner meeting, chief architect Dirk Meyer of AMD will discuss never-before-revealed details about AMD's new K7 processor. The dinner will be preceded by two day-long seminars: "The Intel Microprocessor Forecast: Reacting to a Changing Market" by senior analysts Linley Gwennap and Mel Thomsen; and "Comparing PC Microprocessor Designs" by senior analyst Keith Diefendorff. The event is Thursday, June 10, at the Westin Hotel in Santa Clara, California. Advanced registration is required. The cost is $595 for either seminar, $99 for the dinner meeting, or $645 for either seminar plus dinner. For more details or to register, visit http://www.MDRonline.com/events/sve, or call 800.527.0288 or 707.824.4001.

New Embedded IC Announcements

M16C/20 (Mitsubishi): a 16-bit microcontroller that has an 8-channel, 10-bit A/D converter, three 16-bit timers, 32K of ROM, and 1,024K of RAM. Price: $3.00/10,000; samples: now; production: 3Q99. Call Mitsubishi at 408.774.3189.

PCI2040 (Texas Instruments): a PCI-to-DSP bridge that has 3.3-V core logic and a 16-bit bus. It's available in a 144-pin TQFP or a 12 X 12-mm BGA package. Price: $10.00/1,000; samples: now; production: 2Q99. Call TI at 800.477.8924.