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Survey of Low-Energy Techniques for Instruction Memory Organisations in Embedded Systems

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Abstract

Instruction memory organisations have been pointed out as one of the major sources of energy consumption in embedded systems. As embedded systems are characterised by restrictive resources and a low-energy budget, any enhancement that is introduced into this component of the system will allow embedded designers not only to decrease the total energy consumption, but also to have a better distribution of the energy budget throughout the whole system. The work that is presented in this paper provides a synthesis on the low-energy techniques that are used in instruction memory organisations, outlining their comparative advantages, drawbacks, and trade-offs. Apart from giving the reader a first grasp on the fundamental characteristics and design constraints of various types of instruction memory organisations, the architectural classification that is presented in this paper has the advantage of clearly exhibiting lesser explored techniques, and hence providing hints for future research on instructions memory organisations that are used in embedded systems.

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Acknowledgements

This work is supported by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation, under grant BES-2009-023681, and by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness, under the project TEC2012-33892. The authors would also like to thank J.I. Gomez of Complutense University of Madrid, who reviewed the manuscript and provided valuable comments and suggestions.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Computer Science Faculty, Complutense University of Madrid, Madrid, Spain

    Antonio Artes & Jose L. Ayala

  2. ULP-DSP Research Group, IMEC, Eindhoven, Netherlands

    Jos Huisken

  3. Smart Systems and Energy Technology Department, IMEC, Leuven, Belgium

    Francky Catthoor

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  1. Antonio Artes
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  2. Jose L. Ayala
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  3. Jos Huisken
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  4. Francky Catthoor
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Correspondence to Antonio Artes.

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Artes, A., Ayala, J.L., Huisken, J. et al. Survey of Low-Energy Techniques for Instruction Memory Organisations in Embedded Systems. J Sign Process Syst 70, 1–19 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11265-012-0694-2

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11265-012-0694-2

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