Energy minimization of system pipelines using multiple voltages

Modem computer and communication system design has to consider the timing constraints imposed by communication and system pipelines, and minimize the energy consumption. We adopt the recent proposed model for communication pipeline latency and address the problem of how to minimize the power consumption in system-level pipelines under the latency constraints by selecting supply voltage for each pipeline stage using the variable voltage core-based system design methodology. We define the problem, solve it optimally under realistic assumptions and develop algorithms for power minimization of system pipeline designs based on our theoretical results. We apply this new approach to the 4-stage Myrinet GAM pipeline and with the appropriate voltage profiles, we achieve 93.4%, 91.3% and 26.9% power reduction on three pipeline stages over the traditional design.