Emulator links with testbench accelerator

IKOS Systems has created a transaction-based integration to Verisity's eCelerator.

IKOS Systems has created a transaction-based integration to Verisity's eCelerator.

eCelerator is a testbench acceleration tool that contains innovative new synthesis technology that enables the power of Specman Elite to be combined with the high performance of hardware-assisted verification.

The combination of IKOS' VStation with testbench acceleration provides a powerful, system-level testbench environment that enables designers to quickly generate high-quality tests while dramatically reducing overall verification time.

IKOS offers innovative and powerful accelerated solutions for Specman Elite on both the NSIM accelerator and VStation emulator platforms so that mutual customers can benefit from the immediate increase in verification productivity.

"The powerful combination of Specman Elite and IKOS' hardware verification platforms is key to delivering our sophisticated designs faster to market and with high quality", said Avinash Gautam, general manager, DSP Designs, TI-India.

"The performance boost of 15-25x over software-only simulations allows us to quickly achieve verification completeness and higher design confidence".

With this latest solution, eCelerator synthesises and accelerates testbenches written in the e verification language onto the VStation emulator, resulting in increased verification throughput for Specman Elite users.

Using the proper methodology, highly active portions of the e testbench can be synthesised, including bus functional models, monitors, data checkers, protocol checkers, and error messaging.

A key benefit of this integration is the ability of users to apply emulation with VStation earlier in the design process to perform system-level verification and ensure that the design works in the system environment before committing to silicon.

Users are also able to automate the verification process because they retain all of the power of Specman Elite, including automatic generation of tests, data and temporal checking and functional coverage analysis.

"This truly innovative approach to verification productivity using eCelerator with VStation emulation speeds the process by accelerating Specman Elite testbenches and gives users more control by moving hardware-assisted verification earlier in the design life cycle", commented Linda Prowse Fosler, vice president of marketing for IKOS Systems.

"Improving verification performance has always been a main concern for both IKOS and Verisity and this technology partnership enabled us to work together to make it happen".

"Combining these two technologies enables users to take advantage of the benefits of both approaches", said Dave Tokic, director of strategic marketing for Verisity.

"This integration provides another dramatic step in verification technology and methodology for extremely complex designs".

eCelerator takes advantage of IKOS' comodelling technology, which utilises a fast interface between IKOS' high-performance VStation emulator and Specman Elite to deliver maximum verification productivity.

The foundation for this high-performance interface is IKOS' Transaction Interface Portal (TIP), the industry's first and fastest, high-bandwidth, low-latency, workstation-to-emulator connection that is specifically optimised for processing transactions.

With IKOS' breakthrough comodelling technology transactions (as opposed to clocked events), are passed across the testbench interface to reduce the I/O congestion between the software running on the workstation and the design running which yields performance up to 50 times over a software-only simulation.

IKOS' VStation emulator is a complete SoC verification platform offering a simulation-like user interface; easy-to-use in-circuit emulation; high-performance comodelling through TIP; data streaming with virtually unlimited vector width; and fully integrated RTL compile and debug capabilities.

VStation verifies highly complex designs of up to 15 million gates, and operates at emulation speeds of up to 2MHs.

It also incorporates IKOS' patented VirtuaLogic compiler and VirtualWires technology to enable easy memory modeling; accurate modeling of asynchronous clocks; fast, fully automated partitioning and compilation; 100% visibility of internal and external signals; and scalable capacity at a lower cost per gate with each successive generation of the emulator to stay ahead of designers' expanding needs for hardware development and software and system validation.

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