A low-power multithreaded processor for baseband communication systems

Abstract

Embedded digital signal processors for baseband communication systems have stringent design constraints including high computational bandwidth, low power consumption, and low interrupt latency. Furthermore, these processors should be compiler-friendly, so that code for them can quickly be developed in a high-level language. This paper presents the design of a high-performance, low-power digital signal processor for baseband communication systems. The processor uses token triggered threading, SIMD vector processing, and powerful compound instructions to provide real-time baseband processing capabilities with very low power consumption. Using a super-computer class vectorizing compiler, the processor achieves real-time performance on a 2Mbps WCDMA transmission system. © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2004.