DSP Systems using Three-Dimensional (3D) Integration Technology

Abstract

As three-dimensional (3D) integration technology is quickly maturing and steadily entering mainstream markets, it has begun to attract exploding interest from integrated circuit and system designers. This chapter discusses and demonstrates the exciting opportunities and potentials for digital signal processing (DSP) circuit and system designers to exploit 3D integration technology. In particular, this chapter advocates a 3D logic-DRAM integration paradigm and addresses the use of 3D logic-memory integration in both programmable digital signal processors and application-specific digital signal processing circuits. To further demonstrate the potential, this chapter presents case studies on applying 3D logic-DRAM integration to clustered VLIW (very long instruction word) digital signal processors and application-specific video encoders. Since DSP systems using 3D integration technology is still in its research infancy, by presenting some first discussions and results, the aim of this chapter is to motivate greater future efforts from DSP system research community to explore this new and rewarding research area.