ABSTRACT
Power dissipation limits have emerged as a key constraint in the design of microprocessors, even for those targeted for the high-end server product space. At the low end of the performance spectrum, power has always dominated over performance as the primary design constraint. However, although battery life expectancies have shown modest increases, the larger demand for increased functionality and speed has increased the severity of the power constraint in the world of handheld and mobile systems. At the high end, where performance was always the primary driver, we are witnessing a trend where increasingly, energy and power limits are dictating the high-level processing paradigms, as well as the lower-level issues related to clocking and circuit design.
