Improved layout-driven area-constrained timing optimization by net buffering

With the advent of deep sub-micron technologies, interconnect loads and delays have become significant, and layout-driven synthesis has become the need of the day. However, due to the tight layout constraints (e.g., area availability, congestion), only layout-friendly logic transforms such as net buffering and gate resizing can be used effectively. In this paper, we address the problem of minimizing the delay of a mapped, roughly-placed and globally-routed design by buffer insertion and/or deletion without violating the local area constraints imposed by the layout. To the best of our knowledge, only one earlier work has addressed this problem (Murgai, 2000). Although the algorithm presented by Murgai (2000) is optimum for a single net, it has worst-case exponential run-time and is not suitable for large nets. In this paper, we present techniques to make this algorithm practical by improving the run-time without sacrificing the quality. We present a condition called ONPRB, which, if satisfied by the net, improves the worst case runtime complexity to quadratic, without causing a loss in optimality. A study of industrial designs showed that up to 80% of the critical nets satisfied the ONPRB condition. To further reduce the run-time, we propose a technique to convert a net into one that satisfies this condition. Experiments on industrial designs show that the proposed scheme gives up to 12.5 times speed-up over (Murgai, 2000), without sacrificing the design quality (i.e., final delay and area).

[1]  Massoud Pedram,et al.  Routability-Driven Fanout Optimization , 1993, 30th ACM/IEEE Design Automation Conference.

[2]  Chung-Kuan Cheng,et al.  Optimal wire sizing and buffer insertion for low power and a generalized delay model , 1995, Proceedings of IEEE International Conference on Computer Aided Design (ICCAD).

[3]  Peter Suaris,et al.  A Methodology and Algorithms for Post-Placement Delay Optimization , 1994, 31st Design Automation Conference.

[4]  Rajeev Murgai Layout-driven area-constrained timing optimization by net buffering , 2000, IEEE/ACM International Conference on Computer Aided Design. ICCAD - 2000. IEEE/ACM Digest of Technical Papers (Cat. No.00CH37140).

[5]  Mark Horowitz,et al.  Signal Delay in RC Tree Networks , 1983, IEEE Trans. Comput. Aided Des. Integr. Circuits Syst..

[6]  Charles J. Alpert,et al.  Buffer insertion for noise and delay optimization , 1998, Proceedings 1998 Design and Automation Conference. 35th DAC. (Cat. No.98CH36175).

[7]  David S. Kung A fast fanout optimization algorithm for near-continuous buffer libraries , 1998, Proceedings 1998 Design and Automation Conference. 35th DAC. (Cat. No.98CH36175).

[8]  Rajeev Murgai,et al.  Layout-driven Logic Optimization , 2007 .

[9]  Rajeev Murgai,et al.  Delay-constrained area recovery via layout-driven buffer optimization , 2000, VLSI Design 2000. Wireless and Digital Imaging in the Millennium. Proceedings of 13th International Conference on VLSI Design.

[10]  L.P.P.P. van Ginneken,et al.  Buffer placement in distributed RC-tree networks for minimal Elmore delay , 1990 .

[11]  Jiang Hu,et al.  Fast and flexible buffer trees that navigate the physical layout environment , 2004, Proceedings. 41st Design Automation Conference, 2004..

[12]  Martin D. F. Wong,et al.  A new algorithm for routing tree construction with buffer insertion and wire sizing under obstacle constraints , 2001, IEEE/ACM International Conference on Computer Aided Design. ICCAD 2001. IEEE/ACM Digest of Technical Papers (Cat. No.01CH37281).

[13]  Paul Penfield,et al.  Signal Delay in RC Tree Networks , 1981, 18th Design Automation Conference.

[14]  Charles J. Alpert,et al.  Wire segmenting for improved buffer insertion , 1997, DAC.