Repeater insertion in crosstalk-aware inductively and capacitively coupled interconnects

Abstract

This paper reveals that repeater insertion not only reduces propagation delay but also reduces crosstalk level in coupled interconnects. Repeaters can therefore be efficiently utilized for reduction in propagation delay and crosstalk noise at a trade-off marginal increase in power dissipation. Conventionally, Power Delay Product (PDP) criterion is used to insert repeaters into long interconnects. A new criterion, the Power-Delay-Crosstalk-Product (PDCP), is introduced as an efficient condition, to insert repeaters into long coupled interconnect. Various criteria, such as minimum delay, minimum PDP and minimum PDCP, are applied for achieving optimum repeater insertion. The performance of PDCP criterion is compared with PDP criterion in terms of optimum number of repeaters, power dissipation, propagation delay and crosstalk for a wide range of coupling combinations. It is observed that instead of PDP criterion, PDCP criterion is best suited for the determination of optimum number of repeaters for overall minimization of delay, power and crosstalk. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.