Efficient Dynamic Reconfiguration for Multi-context Embedded FPGA

Abstract : Dynamic reconfiguration on fine-grained architecture can only be reached by multi-context FPGAs when reconfiguration time is a critical issue. Un- fortunately the multiple contexts bring power and area overhead. This pa- per introduces the Dynamic Unifier and reConfigurable blocK (DUCK), a new structure to perform efficiently dynamic reconfiguration. The DUCK allows to separate the configuration path and the configuration registers which facilitates simultaneous configuration and computing steps. The reconfiguration process using the DUCK concept is presented in detail and synthesis results are given for different structures. Our solution is finally validated with the implementation of a WCDMA receiver on a multi-context embedded FPGA and demonstrates the interest and the efficiency of using dynamic reconfiguration.