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Traffic-load-aware virtual channel power-gating in network-on-chips

Sadrosadati, M ; Sharif University of Technology | 2022

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  1. Type of Document: Article
  2. DOI: 10.1016/bs.adcom.2021.09.001
  3. Publisher: Academic Press Inc , 2022
  4. Abstract:
  5. Network-on-Chips (NoCs) employ several virtual channels per input port to mitigate head-of-line blocking issue in transmitting network packets. Unfortunately, these virtual channels are power-hungry resources that significantly contribute to the total power consumption of NoCs. In particular, we make the key observation that even in high load traffic, a number of virtual channels are idle, imposing significant static power overhead. Prior works use power-gating technique to switch off idle VCs and reduce the static power consumption. However, we observe that prior works are mostly suitable for low traffic loads and are ineffective in high traffic loads. In this chapter, we aim to propose a new power-gating mechanism for virtual channels that is effective for various traffic loads. Our proposal dynamically activates virtual channels according to the traffic of the NOC. Virtual channels enable reaching higher throughput in case of heavy traffic loads. Therefore to avoid performance drop, we adjust the number of virtual channels for each port dynamically according to the requirements of each workload. Results indicate that our proposed technique reduces static power consumption by 40%, on average, with negligible performance overhead. © 2022 Elsevier Inc
  6. Keywords:
  7. Network-on-Chips ; Performance ; Power ; Virtual channels
  8. Source: Advances in Computers ; Volume 124 , 2022 , Pages 1-19 ; 00652458 (ISSN); 9780323856881 (ISBN)
  9. URL: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0065245821000541