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Basic SoC Components

This section is a tour of actual hardware components (IP blocks) found on chips, presented with schematics and illustrative RTL fragments, and connected using a simple bus. Later we will look at other busses and networks on chip.

In the old-fashioned approach, we notice that the hand-crafted RTL used for the hardware implementation has no computerised connection with the firmware, device drivers or non-synthesisable models used for architectural exploration.

Today, XML representations of IP-block metainfo resolve this (IP-XACT and OVM/UVM will be mentioned in the last lecture if time permits).


1: (C) 2008-13, DJ Greaves, University of Cambridge, Computer Laboratory.