Cluster assignment for high-performance embedded VLIW processors

Abstract

Clustering is an effective method to increase the available parallelism in VLIW datapaths without incurring severe penalties associated with a large number of register file ports. Efficient utilization of a clustered datapath requires careful binding/assignment of operations to clusters. The article proposes a binding algorithm that effectively explores trade-offs between in-cluster operation serialization and delays associated with data transfers between clusters. Extensive experimental evidence is provided showing that the algorithm generates high quality solutions for representative kernels, with up to 33% improvement over a state-of-the-art binding algorithm.