A Comparative Power Analysis of an Asynchronous Processor

A. Efthymiou, J.D. Garside, S. Temple

Abstract

Distributing a high-speed clock in a large synchronous system is both difficult and power hungry. It has been suggested for some time that asynchronous processors may therefore prove advantageous for low power applications. An analysis of the reasons for this is given, together with a direct comparison showing that the AMULET3 asynchronous ARM processor is at least as energy efficient as its contemporary, synchronous counterpart. Moreover micro-architecture techniques utilising the asynchronous design style that can further improve the power efficiency, are presented.

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