Intel® Quartus® Prime Standard Edition User Guide: Power Analysis and Optimization

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ID 683506
Date 9/24/2018
Public
Document Table of Contents
Document Table of Contents x
1. Power Analysis 2. Power Optimization A. Intel® Quartus® Prime Standard Edition User Guides
1. Power Analysis x
1.1. Comparison of the EPE and the Intel® Quartus® Prime Power Analyzer 1.2. Power Estimations and Design Requirements 1.3. Power Analyzer Walkthrough 1.4. Inputs for the Power Analyzer 1.5. Power Analysis in Modular Design Flows 1.6. Power Analyzer Compilation Report 1.7. Scripting Support 1.8. Power Analysis Revision History
1.4. Inputs for the Power Analyzer x
1.4.1. Operating Settings and Conditions 1.4.2. Sources for Signal Activity Data
1.4.2. Sources for Signal Activity Data x
1.4.2.1. Waveforms from Supported Simulators 1.4.2.2. .vcd Files from Third-Party Simulation Tools 1.4.2.3. Signal Activities from RTL (Functional) Simulation, Supplemented by Vectorless Estimation 1.4.2.4. Signal Activities from Vectorless Estimation and User-Supplied Input Pin Activities 1.4.2.5. Signal Activities from User Defaults Only
1.4.2.2. .vcd Files from Third-Party Simulation Tools x
1.4.2.2.1. Generating a .vcd in a EDA Simulation Tool 1.4.2.2.2. Generating a .vcd from ModelSim® Software
1.4.2.3. Signal Activities from RTL (Functional) Simulation, Supplemented by Vectorless Estimation x
1.4.2.3.1. RTL Simulation Limitation
1.5. Power Analysis in Modular Design Flows x
1.5.1. Complete Design Simulation 1.5.2. Modular Design Simulation 1.5.3. Multiple Simulations on the Same Entity 1.5.4. Overlapping Simulations 1.5.5. Partial Simulations 1.5.6. Node Name Matching Considerations 1.5.7. Glitch Filtering 1.5.8. Node and Entity Assignments 1.5.9. Default Toggle Rate Assignment 1.5.10. Vectorless Estimation
1.5.5. Partial Simulations x
1.5.5.1. Specifying Start and End Time when Performing Signal-Activity Calculations using the Limit VCD Period Option
1.5.7. Glitch Filtering x
1.5.7.1. Enabling Tool Based Glitch Filtering 1.5.7.2. Enabling Glitch Filtering During Power Analysis
1.5.8. Node and Entity Assignments x
1.5.8.1. Timing Assignments to Clock Nodes
1.7. Scripting Support x
1.7.1. Running the Power Analyzer from the Command–Line
2. Power Optimization x
2.1. Factors Affecting Power Consumption 2.2. Power Dissipation 2.3. Design Space Explorer II for Power-Driven Optimization 2.4. Power-Driven Compilation 2.5. Design Guidelines 2.6. Power Optimization Advisor 2.7. Power Optimization Revision History
2.1. Factors Affecting Power Consumption x
2.1.1. Design Activity and Power Analysis 2.1.2. Device Selection 2.1.3. Environmental Conditions 2.1.4. Device Resource Usage 2.1.5. Signal Activity
2.1.4. Device Resource Usage x
2.1.4.1. Number, Type, and Loading of I/O Pins 2.1.4.2. Number and Type of Hard Logic Blocks 2.1.4.3. Number and Type of Global Signals
2.1.5. Signal Activity x
2.1.5.1. Toggle Rate 2.1.5.2. Static Probability
2.4. Power-Driven Compilation x
2.4.1. Power-Driven Synthesis 2.4.2. Power-Driven Fitter 2.4.3. Area-Driven Synthesis 2.4.4. Gate-Level Register Retiming 2.4.5. Intel® Quartus® Prime Compiler Settings 2.4.6. Assignment Editor Options
2.4.1. Power-Driven Synthesis x
2.4.1.1. Memory Block Optimization 2.4.1.2. Power-Aware Logic Mapping 2.4.1.3. Power-Aware Memory Balancing
2.5. Design Guidelines x
2.5.1. Clock Power Management 2.5.2. Pipelining and Retiming 2.5.3. Architectural Optimization 2.5.4. I/O Power Guidelines 2.5.5. Memory Optimization (M20K/MLAB) 2.5.6. DDR Memory Controller Settings 2.5.7. DSP Implementation 2.5.8. Reducing High-Speed Tile (HST) Usage 2.5.9. Unused Transceiver Channels 2.5.10. Periphery Power reduction XCVR Settings
2.5.1. Clock Power Management x
2.5.1.1. Clock Enable in Memory Blocks 2.5.1.2. LAB Clock Power 2.5.1.3. Clock Enables 2.5.1.4. Global Signals 2.5.1.5. Merge Clocks
2.5.1.1. Clock Enable in Memory Blocks x
2.5.1.1.1. Memory Power Reduction Example
2.5.1.2. LAB Clock Power x
2.5.1.2.1. LAB-Wide Clock Enable Example
2.5.1.4. Global Signals x
2.5.1.4.1. Viewing Clock Details in the Chip Planner
2.5.5. Memory Optimization (M20K/MLAB) x
2.5.5.1. Implementation 2.5.5.2. Rd/Wr Enables
2.5.10. Periphery Power reduction XCVR Settings x
2.5.10.1. Transceiver Settings 2.5.10.2. I/O Current Strength
2.6. Power Optimization Advisor x
2.6.1. Set Realistic Timing Constraints 2.6.2. Appropriate Device Family 2.6.3. Dynamic Power 2.6.4. Static Power 2.6.5. Appropriate I/O Standards 2.6.6. Use RAM Blocks 2.6.7. Shut Down RAM Blocks 2.6.8. Clock Enables on Logic 2.6.9. Pipeline Logic to Reduce Glitching
2.6.1. Set Realistic Timing Constraints x
2.6.1.1. Find Timing Information
1. Power Analysis
2. Power Optimization
A. Intel® Quartus® Prime Standard Edition User Guides

2.4.4. Gate-Level Register Retiming

You can also use gate-level register retiming to reduce circuit switching activity. Retiming shuffles registers across combinational blocks without changing design functionality.

The Perform gate-level register retiming option in the Intel® Quartus® Prime software enables the movement of registers across combinational logic to balance timing, allowing the software to trade off the delay between critical and noncritical paths.

Retiming uses fewer registers than pipelining. In this example of gate-level register retiming, the 10 ns critical delay is reduced by moving the register relative to the combinational logic, resulting in the reduction of data depth and switching activity.

Figure 10. Gate-Level Register Retiming

Gate-level register retiming makes changes at the gate level. If you are using an atom netlist from a third-party synthesis tool, you must also select the Perform WYSIWYG primitive resynthesis option to undo the atom primitives to gates mapping (so that register retiming can be performed), and then to remap gates to Intel primitives.

When using Intel® Quartus® Prime integrated synthesis, retiming occurs during synthesis before the design is mapped to Intel primitives. The benchmark data shows that the combination of WYSIWYG remapping and gate-level register retiming techniques can reduce power consumption by as much as 6% in Stratix® devices and as much as 21% in Cyclone® devices.

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