Case Study: Getting More Functionality from Existing Chips

By _Inside DSP

May 23, 2011

These days, few system design teams can afford the expense and time of developing a custom chip tailored to their specific needs.  Therefore, most system designers are forced to rely on off-the-shelf chips that are a less-than-perfect fit for their needs.  And even teams that are able to design their own chips must minimize the frequency of doing so, given the costs of creating a new chip.

For these reasons, embedded system designers often find themselves needing to shoehorn new functionality into old chips—whether those chips are of their own design, or designed by a chip supplier.

In some cases, diligent optimization of existing or new software can be used to fit new functionality into an existing design.  In other cases, a chip is already so heavily loaded that adding functionality requires a more creative approach.

To read the full article, click here