Multicore DSPs Suit Wireless Infrastructure And Video

The OCT220 family of power-efficient DSP solutions from Octasic targets media gateways and high-definition (HD) video and wireless systems. These devices use the company’s highly efficient Opus DSP core architecture to enable system designers to achieve both very low power consumption and the highest levels of performance in the same device.

Article Tools

Competitive devices are forced to choose low power or high performance. Octasic offers both in a completely software programmable solution. Devices based on the second generation of the Opus DSP core (Opus2) can deliver more than 36 GMACs (giga-multiply-add computations) with less than 55 mW of power consumption per GMAC under worst-case process, voltage, and temperature (PVT) conditions.

An interesting feature of the OCT2200 series is the asynchronous operation of its DSP cores. With less internal clocking, it decreases power consumption but significantly boosts performance. The OCT2200 devices incorporate 24 Opus2 DSP cores with a rich set of I/O interfaces and an optional ARM core to provide an ideal platform for a broad range of applications.

The OCT2224M suits media processing, and the OCT2224W fits wireless baseband applications. Targeted media applications include wireline and wireless media gateways, Internet protocol public branch exchanges (IP PBXs), audio/video transcoding gateways, HD video conferencing and streaming, video surveillance DVRs, and medical imaging. Specific wireless applications include basestation products with single-chip femtocell and picocell solutions, as well as multi-chip macrocells.

The OCT2200 series provides more than 30 GMACs in a single device with less than 1.8-W worst-case core power consumption. These devices also offer a rich set of integrated I/O interfaces, including Serial Rapid IO (SRIO), PCI Express, Gigabit Ethernet, multiple RF antenna part interfaces, USB, Smart Card, and serial voice streams (TDM). An integrated ARM processor is an option.

With the OCT2200 series, Octasic is also releasing Opus Studio. This integrated graphical development environment enables customers to quickly begin the development of unique applications. In addition to developing their own code, customers can draw on an extensive set of libraries for voice, video, RF, and generic signal processing.

The OCT2224M’s performance allows complete encoding for two 1080p video streams simultaneously with no dedicated hardware acceleration. Built on the same technology, the OCT2224W can implement a complete multi-standard picocell that can provide Long-Term Evolution (LTE), WiMAX, HSPA+, EDGE, or any other commercial wireless standard on a single hardware platform.

The OCT2224W may be the most efficient multicore DSP device for basestation physical layer (PHY) and MAC in the industry. Octasic claims that it delivers three times more power efficiency than any other DSP on the market today for software-defined radio (SDR) implementations. It addresses the rapidly growing market for small-cell and femtocell-based applications.

Continue to next page

Want to use this article? Click here for options!
© 2012 Penton Media Inc.


Acceptable Use Policy blog comments powered by Disqus


Latest Issue

Features:

View Entire Issue

Most Popular Stories

Resources

Special Coverage

CTIA Wireless IT & Entertainment 2010

Read the latest from the show...