EL 512

VLSI Subsystem Design

Instructor:
Mazad S. Zaveri
Faculty Block 4, Room 4206
Email: mazad_zaveri@daiict.ac.in
http://intranet.daiict.ac.in/~mazad_zaveri/

EL 511 VLSI

Pulse Generators (for Pulsed Latch)

See scanned notes

2

EL 511 VLSI

Time borrowing (FF based system)

FF based system
Data departs the first FF on the rising edge of the clock and must setup
at the second FF before the nest rising edge
If data arrives early, then it is blocked (or waits) until the next clock edge,
and the remaining time goes unused
If data arrives late (within the setup window), then wrong data will be stored

Hence, borrowing the unused time may not be possible in such systems

EL 511 VLSI

Time Borrowing (2-phase Latch)

Borrowing time is possible

For the pipeline architecture
Could borrow time from the current stages half-cycle, and also from next stage

For loopy (FSM-like) architectures

Could borrow time from the current stages cycle only

EL 511 VLSI

Maximum amount of time borrowing (2-phase latch)

Borrow time, is roughly the pulse width minus the setup
time
It can be maximized by making the pulse width almost =
(Tc / 2), i.e. by making tnonoverlap almost zero
(tnonoverlap cannot be zero, because then both latches may be ON,
and data could race through)

EL 511 VLSI

Time borrowing (pulsed latch)

Equation is for pulse-width > setup time condition
This equation is similar to that of the 2-phase latch
system, (i.e. pulse width minus setup time)
So it means we should increase pulse width for larger
borrow time
However, doing that will increase your effective hold time (for
the min-delay constraint), and cause min-delay constraint failure

EL 511 VLSI

Clock Skew (FF)

Clock skew is undesirable

When it decreases the time available for logic
propagation tpd (in the max-delay constraint)
It will eat up some of the clock-period time, or effectively
reduce it

It increases the effective hold time, hence, increasing

the min. logic contamination time tcd (in min-delay
constraint)

EL 511 VLSI

Clock skew (2-phase latch)

Clock skew will affect the min-delay, and borrowing time

How will clock skew affect max-delay?
Authors assumption: It does not affect the max-delay, because the data still has
an available window (within the transparent pulse width) in which it can arrive
However, those windows are now smaller, so carefully designing the logic (with skew
budget in mind) the data arrival can be controlled within those windows
Hence, from that perspective, we call this system skew-tolerant (and NOT skewindependent) for max-delay
Effectively increases
hold time

Effectively reduces
borrowing time

EL 511 VLSI

Clock skew (Pulsed latch)

If the pulse width is narrow, skew can adversely affect
min-delay constraint and borrowing time
For max-delay,
If pulse width is large, skew can be tolerated, because there is a
transparent window during which the data can arrive
If pulse width is narrow, skew will affect the max-delay

EL 511 VLSI

Topics to read
From the DJVU file
7.2 (Pg. 384)
7.2.1
7.2.2
7.2.3
7.2.4
7.2.5
7.3.1 (Fig. 7.17)
10