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Henryk A. Kowalski

Why DSP Processors

Got Extinct? (Private Investigation)

Electrical & Computer Engineering

Faculty of Electronics & Information Technology, Warsaw University of Technology

Presentation Outline

What is DSP?

SOC, ASIC, Embedded System

Facts

Evidences

Conclusion

Example

Is there a relationship between DSP processors

and archaeological research?

Summary

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What is DSP Processor?

DSP means:

Digital Signal Processing

Digital Signal Processor (DSP processor)

A digital signal processor (DSP) is a

specialized microprocessor with an

optimized architecture for the fast

operational needs of digital signal

processing.

SOC – System on Chip

A system on chip (SOC) is an integrated

circuit (IC) that integrates all components

of a computer or other electronic system

into a single chip.

It may contain digital, analog, mixed-

signal, and often radio-frequency

functions—all on a single chip substrate.

A typical application is in the area of

embedded systems. 4

ASIC – Application Specific

Integrated Circuit An application-specific integrated circuit

(ASIC) is an integrated circuit (IC)

customized for a particular use, rather than

intended for general-purpose use.

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For example, a chip

designed to run in a

digital voice recorder is

an ASIC.

Embedded System

An embedded system is a computer

system designed for specific (control)

functions often with real-time computing.

Physically, embedded systems range from

portable devices such as digital watches

and MP3 players, to large stationary

installations like traffic lights or factory

controllers.

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Fact 1

Many components that were once reported as “DSP chips” are no longer.

Rather, they are reported as:

Systems on chip (SoC) in categories like ASICs (Application Specific Integrated Circuit)

ASSPs (Application Specific Standard Product, as video encoding and/or decoding),

- even by traditional DSP chip vendors like Texas Instruments and Analog Devices.

DSP Silicon Strategies '09 , Report No: 9020, Forward Concepts, 5/2009

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Fact 2

Virtually all MCUs and MPUs have added

either:

Multiply-Accumulator (MAC) circuitry

or Single-Instruction Multiple-Data (SIMD)

circuitry

So they can also perform DSP (and often

graphics) in addition to their traditional

data processing functions.

Wireless Market Bulletin, Forward Concepts, March 9, 2009

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Evidence 1 - DSP Silicon Market

Wireless Market Bulletin, Forward Concepts, May 4, 2009

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Evidence 2

„TI visited us last month and revealed that their digital signal controller (DSC) operations based on the C2000 DSP family will no longer be reported as DSP chips.

That's because the product line is being incorporated into the

company's MCU product line.” Wireless/DSP Market Bulletin , Forward Concepts, September 4, 2008

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Conclusion

The entire semiconductor market is now

driven by DSP technology, since without

DSP there would be no digital wireless, no

multimedia, no VoIP and no Internet

access of any kind.

Example – Galaxy Nexus

A touchscreen Android

smartphone developed by a

partnership between Google

and Samsung.

The Galaxy Nexus features a

dual-core 1.2 GHz TI OMAP

4460 processor (ARM Cortex-

A9) with an accompanying

PowerVR SGX540 and 1 GB of

RAM. 12

Texas Instruments OMAP44x

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Package on Package Stacking

The SoC chip includes processors and

numerous digital peripherals, and comes

in a ball grid package with lower and upper

connections.

The lower balls connect to the board and

various peripherals, with the upper balls in

a ring holding the memory buses used to

access NAND flash and DDR2 RAM. 14

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Summary

In todays new era of always-connected

access to the Internet and multimedia,

DSP is the underlying technology.

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Thanks for Your attention

Thank you for your attention