1.4Gsearch/s 2-Mb/mm² TCAM Using Two-Phase-Pre-Charge ML Sensing and Power-Grid Pre-Conditioning to Reduce Ldi/dt Power-Supply Noise by 50%

This paper describes two power-supply noise (Ldi/dt) management techniques implemented in a 14-nm ternary content-addressable memory (TCAM) compiler that allows a 2K × 640 b instance to perform 1.4Gsearches/s while achieving a density of 2 Mb/mm 2 . This represents a 15% better performance and 10% better density than previous state-of-the-art TCAM. The first technique reduces the within-cycle noise by employing a two-phase match line (ML) pre-charge circuit which shuts off the pre-charge shoot-through current on easy-to-detect multibit mismatched MLs early in the cycle thereby approximately saving 60% of the ML power and reducing the within-cycle noise by 49.7%. The second technique is to reduce the multicycle noise by inserting targeted dummy search operations during low-current demand periods to flatten out current demand and reduce Ldi/dt noise by another 50%.