Power consumption and area are commonly considered in choosing an embedded SoC processor, but the role of the processor’s instruction set architecture (ISA) code density can be more significant, yet is often overlooked.

Newton Abdalla, CAST, Inc. Yuzo Ishikura, Spinnaker Systems The value of semiconductor intellectual property (IP) in saving time and cost while developing complex new Systems-on-Chip (SoC) designs is well understood. But IP also has a valuable role...