VLSI Sandbox’s Post

The VLSI Design Flow 🚀 is a streamlined process that transforms a chip concept into a physical, working product. From specifications 📋 to design 🎨, verification ✅, and layout 📐, each stage ensures efficient, high-performance chip creation. Starting with RTL coding 💻, followed by synthesis 🔧, place & route 📊, and ending with fabrication 🏭 and testing 🔍, this flow powers the chips in devices we use every day—like smartphones and computers 📱💡. A seamless journey from idea to cutting-edge silicon! 🛠️ VLSI Design Flow Overview 🚀: ~Specification 📋: Define design goals, performance, power, area, and tech node. ~High-Level Design 🛠️: Structure the system into modules, setting data flow and communication. ~Low-Level Design 🔍: Detail module behavior and logic implementation. ~RTL Coding 💻: Write RTL using Verilog/VHDL to define data movement between registers. ~Functional Verification ✅: Simulate to check RTL for correctness and fix bugs early. ~Logic Synthesis 🔧: Convert RTL to a gate-level netlist, optimizing for timing, power, and area. ~Gate Level Simulation 🖥️: Verify the netlist under real-world timing and power constraints. ~Place and Route 📐: Physically arrange components and route connections. ~Fabrication 🏭: Manufacture the chip based on the layout design. ~Post-Silicon Validation 🔍: Test the chip in real-world conditions, fixing any bugs. #VLSIDesign #RTLDesign #ChipDesign #PhysicalDesign #Semiconductors #ICDesign #EDA #ASIC #Innovation

Demystifying Synthesis in VLSI Design 🛠️ In the world of #VLSIDesign, synthesis is a critical step that translates high-level hardware descriptions (like Verilog or VHDL) into gate-level representations. 🔑 Key Points: Behavioral to Structural: Synthesis takes RTL code and transforms it into a netlist of logic gates, enabling your design to become real hardware. Optimization: It’s more than translation—it optimizes your design for power, performance, and area (PPA). Various constraints, like timing, area, and power budgets, drive this process. Timing Considerations: Tools check for timing violations (setup and hold time) and ensure the design can operate at the required frequency. Technology Mapping: The logic is mapped to the available cells in the target technology library (standard cells), ensuring compatibility with the manufacturing process. Sequential vs Combinational Logic: Combinational logic and sequential elements (like flip-flops and latches) are handled differently, ensuring proper functionality in different timing scenarios. Post-Synthesis Simulation: Once synthesis is complete, it’s crucial to verify the gate-level netlist to ensure functionality remains intact. 🔍 Final Thoughts: Synthesis is where design becomes reality. It’s the bridge between coding hardware and creating the actual chip. Mastering synthesis optimization is key to achieving the best possible design in terms of performance and power efficiency. 💡 If you’re a PD or RTL engineer, understanding synthesis and its intricacies can massively improve your design workflow and end results! #VLSI #PhysicalDesign #RTLDesign #Synthesis #ChipDesign #Semiconductors #Engineering #ASICDesign

🌟synthesis stage in VLSI 🌟 Synthesis is a critical step for chip designers because it allows them to visualize how the design will appear after manufacture. "Synthesis is a process of converting a high-level of abstraction to a low-level of abstraction" synthesis=Translation+optimization+ mapping we do synthesis for 1) Converting RTL to basic logic gates 2) Mapping those gates to actual technology-dependent logic gates accessible in technology libraries 3) Optimizing the translated netlist while maintaining the designer's limitations. Goals of synthesis is 1) To get a gate-level netlist. 2) Inserting Clock gates. 3) Logic optimization. 4) Inserting DFT logic. 5) Logic Equivalence between RTL and Netlist should be maintained. Inputs required for synthesis. * High-Level Design Description (HDL) (Verilog, VHDL) & Design Exchange Format (DEF file) & Physical Library (LEF) & Timing Library (.lil): Unified Power Format (.upf): & Standard Design Constraints (.sdc) Outputs for synthesis: * Netlist output.SDC #vIsi #vIsijobs #vIsidesign #vIsitraining #vIsicourses #vIsifreshers #vIsijobseekers #lowpower #chipdesign #chips #semiconductor #semiconductorindustry #semiconductorjobs #semiconductormanufacturing #physicaldesign #designengineer #maven #mavensilicon #rvvIsi #cmos #digitalelectronics #banglorejobs #bangalore #electronics #electronicsengineering

Hello connections, Here is an article about chip designing, Chip designing, also known as integrated circuit (IC) design, is the process of creating the layout for an electronic circuit that can be implemented onto a semiconductor wafer to produce functional electronic devices. This process involves several stages, each requiring specialized knowledge and tools. Here’s an overview: 1. **Specification and Planning**: Define the chip's functionality, performance requirements, power consumption, size, and cost constraints. This stage involves understanding the application and setting the design goals. 2. **Architectural Design**: Develop a high-level block diagram outlining the major components and their interconnections. This stage includes decisions about the architecture, such as the type of processor, memory configuration, and interfaces. 3. **Logic Design**: Create a detailed design at the logic level using hardware description languages (HDLs) like VHDL or Verilog. This stage involves designing the digital logic circuits, including combinational and sequential logic. 4. **Verification**: Perform simulations to verify that the logic design meets the specified requirements. This stage involves running test cases and ensuring that the design behaves correctly under all conditions. 5. **Synthesis**: Convert the verified logic design into a gate-level netlist, which maps the high-level design to the actual logic gates that will be used in the chip. This process involves optimizing the design for performance, area, and power consumption. 6. **Physical Design**: Translate the gate-level netlist into a physical layout. This stage includes placement (deciding where each component will be located on the chip), routing (connecting the components with metal traces), and layout verification to ensure there are no design rule violations. 7. **Fabrication**: Send the final layout to a semiconductor foundry where the chip is manufactured. This involves photolithography and other processes to create the physical IC on a silicon wafer. 8. **Testing**: Once fabricated, the chips are tested to ensure they meet the functional and performance specifications. This stage involves various testing techniques, including functional testing, performance testing, and burn-in testing to ensure reliability. 9. **Packaging**: Encapsulate the chip in a protective package that can be mounted on a circuit board. The packaging stage also involves adding necessary connections (pins or pads) to interface with other components. #snsinstuitions #snsdesignthinkers #snsdesignthinking

I also learnt about the industrial standard way of fabricating a chip and I found out that there are 10 majors that must be taken in other for a chip to be fabricated 1) Specification: Define the functionalities. 2)Design: Create a high-level architectural design, including logic circuits, memory, and interfaces. 3)RTL Design: Convert the architectural design into a Register Transfer Level (RTL) description using hardware description languages like Verilog or VHDL. 4)Simulation: Verify the RTL design through functional simulation to ensure it meets the specifications. 5)Synthesis: Translate the RTL design into a netlist of logic gates and optimize it for area, power, and timing. 6)Physical Design: Place and route the gates on the chip's layout, considering factors like timing constraints, signal integrity, and power distribution. 7)Verification: Perform various verification steps, including timing analysis, design rule checking, and circuit simulation, to ensure the physical design meets the specifications. 8)Mask Generation: Create the masks or photomasks used in the semiconductor fabrication process based on the final layout. 9)Fabrication: Fabricate the chip using semiconductor manufacturing processes, such as photolithography, etching, and doping, to create the desired transistor and interconnect patterns on silicon wafers. 10)Testing: Test the fabricated chips for functionality, performance, and reliability... @ Tiny Tapeout MosChip #100daysamplifierdesign..

Hi connections!! I have completed VLSI on chip design on maven silicon. Overview of course. 1. Specification: Defining the functionalities, performance, and constraints of the chip. 2. Architecture Design: Creating a high-level plan of how the chip will meet the specifications, including block diagrams and data paths. 3. Logic Design: Developing the logic circuits that will perform the specified functions, often using hardware description languages (HDLs) like VHDL or Verilog. 4. Circuit Design: Translating logic designs into circuits using transistors, resistors, and capacitors. 5. Physical Design: Mapping the circuit design onto the physical silicon, which involves placement and routing of components and ensuring the design meets all physical and timing constraints. 6. Verification and Testing: Ensuring that the design works as intended through simulation and testing, and making necessary corrections. VLSI design is critical in producing efficient, high-performance microchips used in various applications, from consumer electronics to advanced computing systems. #mavan silicon #vlsi #physical design

🌟 Extremely grateful to share a new accomplishment! 🎓 I'm at the finish line of the CND Electronics Training program in the Digital IC Design and Verification Track organized by The American University in Cairo. 🚀 🔹 This program has given me expertise in the digital design flow for ASIC, including Verilog modeling, synthesis, minimization, standard-cell libraries, timing optimization, timing models, timing analysis and constraints, Clock Tree Synthesis, placement and routing, Signoff and chip finishing, and design for testing. 🔹 In addition to digital design flow, the program covered the verification and testing of digital systems. We learned SystemVerilog concepts such as data types, functions, threads, interfaces, randomization, Code Coverage, Functional Coverage, and Assertion based Verification. We also applied UVM verification projects, which included components such as transaction, generator, configuration, sequencer, driver, and monitor. We also covered topics such as faults in digital systems, test generation, testable systems, pattern generation, and comparator circuits of the built-in-self-test. 🔹 Moreover, the program covered VLSI and full custom IC design flow topics, which included the design of complex digital circuits, PLA, Arithmetic Blocks, Memory Design, system interconnect, Clock Generators, and System Level Integration. It emphasized principles such as power optimization, timing analysis, and signal and power integrity issues. 🔹 The program was delivered by worldwide industry experts and university professors. We gained hands-on experience in the labs with industry-standard CAD instruments, and we completed assignments and projects for each course. 🔹 CAD tools included Synopsys’s flow (Design Compiler, Formality, Library Manager, ICC2, PrimeTime, VCS, Verdi), Siemens’s flow (Tanner EDA: S-Edit, L-Edit, W-Edit, Calibre), Questa, Intel’s Quartus, and Cadence Virtuoso. 📚 Languages: SystemVerilog, Verilog. #CND_Electronics #AUC #Digital_Design #Si_vision #Siemens #Intel #Synopsys #ASIC #VLSI #Verification #UVM #SystemVerilog #Verilog

One of the important aspect in Verifying a RTL design is to use Assertion Based Verification (ABV) techniques. Assertions are used as a check against a design. For VLSI, someone needs to provide equal emphasis to SystemVerilog Assertions (SVA) in addition to Verilog, SV, Digital Design, etc. Below are some of the advantages of using Assertions in both RTL design and Verification: [1] SVA has to be written by both RTL designers and Verification engineers. RTL assertions mostly deals with microarchitectural specification while verification engineers deals with interface and functionality based assertions. [2] SVA improves the Observability of the design and thereby reducing the overall debug effort. This can be achieved by inserting various check points within the specific areas of the design to check the effect of internal bug instead of waiting for the entire Testcase to complete and then to backtrace the signal to find out the bug. [3] SVA can be written at multiple places within the Testbench like interfaces, monitor, scoreboard and even using bind with the top module to improve the probability of catching bugs within the design. [4] SVA has the keyword called as “cover” which will make sure the assertions are covered and is also used as a key indicator to measure verification progress. [5] SVA reduces the time to bring up the code because a simple logic may became cumbersome while trying to implement with Verilog and hence it makes the code more readable. Property P1; @(posedge clk) abc |-> ##[1:2] cd; endproperty assert property (P1); [6] SVA has assertion directives like assume, expect and restrict apart from assert which can be used in coding several temporal assertion as per the requirement. [7] Assertions has the capability to capture specific scenarios to measure coverage which is a important parameter to close coverage. [8] Since assertions are by default always on, they are useful in tracking the Testcases faster in case of any error. #vlsi #asic #electronics #electricalengineering

Greetings Connections, VLSI Physical Design With Timing Analysis Day - 01 Contents: Lecture - 01: Introduction to VLSI Design 1. Significance of Physical Design 2. VLSI Design Styles 3. Design Abstraction Levels 4. Views of a Model 5. Y - chart Representation 6. Synthesis VLSI Design Styles are categorised as: Full Custom Design Semi - Custom Design Types of Semi-Custom Design: 1. Cell Design (Standard Cells, Macro Cells) 2. Array Design (Gate Arrays, FPGA'S) Design Abstraction Levels: 1. Behavioral Level 2. Register-Transfer Level (RTL) 3. Gate Level 4. Transistor Level Y-Chart Representation: The Y-Chart, proposed by Gajski and Kuhn, is a model for describing and visualizing the different views and abstraction levels of a design. Abstractions in VLSI Design: 1. Architectural Level 2. Logic Level 3. Geometrical Level Views of a Model: 1. Behavioral View 2. Structural View 3. Physical View Synthesis in VLSI Design: 1. Architectural Level Synthesis 2. Logic Level Synthesis 3. Geometrical Level Synthesis Lecture - 02: Introduction to VLSI Physical Design 1. VLSI Design Flow 2. Physical Design Cycle 3. Physical Verification VLSI Design Flow: 1) System Specifications 2) Architectural Design 3) Functional Design and Logic Design 4) Circuit Design 5) Physical Design 6) Physical Verification and Signoff 7) Fabrication 8) Packaging and Testing Physical Design Cycle: 1) Partitioning 2) Chip Planning 3) Placement 4) Clock Tree Synthesis (CTS) 5) Signal Routing 6) Timing Closure Physical Verification: 1) Design Rule Check (DRC) 2) Layout vs Schematic (LVS) 3) Electrical Rule Check (ERC) 4) Antenna Rule Check (ARC) #VLSI #PhysicalDesign #Semiconductor #ChipDesign #ElectronicsEngineering #IntegratedCircuits #ASICDesign #FPGA #DesignAbstraction #TechnologySynthesis #HardwareDescriptionLanguages #FullCustomDesign #SemiCustomDesign #YChart #ArchitectureDesign #LogicDesign #RTL #CircuitDesign #PhysicalDesign #ChipLayout #Verification #TimingAnalysis #Fabrication #Testing #Deployment #Partitioning #Floorplanning #Placement #ClockSynthesis #Routing #TimingClosure #DRC #LVS #ERC #ARC

Hello Connections 🚀 Successfully Designed and Simulated a 16KB Memory using Verilog! 🚀 I'm thrilled to share a recent milestone in my journey as a VLSI design engineer! I completed the design and simulation of a 16KB memory module by breaking it down into four 4KB memory blocks, written in Verilog. This modular approach not only made the design more efficient but also allowed for easier debugging and scalability. 💡 🔑 Project Highlights: Memory Structure: A 16KB memory divided into 4 independent 4KB blocks, ensuring modular and reusable design. Addressing Logic: A 14-bit address input was implemented, where the top 2 bits determined the block selection, and the lower 12 bits pointed to the location within the block. Seamless Read/Write Operations: Validated the functionality of the design through a comprehensive set of read and write cycles. 🛠 Verification Process: To verify the functionality, I developed a thorough testbench that ran multiple scenarios across different addresses. Using ModelSim, I simulated the design and analyzed waveforms to ensure proper data flow during both read and write operations. The verification process was successful, and the waveforms confirmed the expected behavior for memory access. 🖥️ Tools Used: Code Editing: Gvim text editor was my go-to for writing and organizing the Verilog code. Simulation & Waveform Analysis: ModelSim was utilized to compile, simulate, and verify the design through in-depth waveform inspections, ensuring the accuracy of the memory model. 💪 Challenges Overcome: Addressing large memory designs with efficient block selection logic Ensuring proper data handling during simultaneous memory access Analyzing complex waveform outputs to confirm the design’s correctness 💻 Skills & Technologies: Verilog, Digital Design, Memory Design, Testbenches, ModelSim, Simulation & Verification, FPGA Design, Modular Design Architecture, Hardware Verification. GITHUB Link : https://lnkd.in/gD7-wZ-C This project has enhanced my understanding of memory architecture and gave me deeper insights into the importance of block-level design in VLSI systems. Excited to take on more challenges in the realm of Digital Design and Verification! #DV #DesignandVerification #Verilog #MemoryDesign #DigitalDesign #VLSI #SystemVerilog #FPGA #Testbench #EDA #HardwareVerification #Simulation #ModelSim #Gvim #HardwareDesign #MemoryArchitecture #Semiconductors #ASIC #ChipDesign #EDAtools #HardwareEngineer #DesignVerification