Pipeline Processing in digital logic design. Parallel Processing from here.

Pipeline Processing :- This technique is most followed technique in the digital design which involves breaking down of an sequential process into sub operations (lets call it sub-blocks). The sub-blocks are then pushed into a series of hardware blocks to process it independent of the complete operation. 

Lets first discuss it with virtual pipe block diagram.

Pipeline Processing.

An example of non-pipeline vs. pipeline.
4 similar segments/threads needs to be processed through a pipeline design. 

Before we implement the design, lets break each segment into 5 sub-blocks that can be processed independent of other blocks. Each sub-block is implemented as a stage in diagram. 

LTE - 4G Wireless Technology

Digital fundamentals.

Interview Questions.

Now we can implement the design in following manner. Start pushing each segment through the pipe so that at 
Time 1 - Stage 1 is processing - Segment 1, sub-block 1.
Time 2 - Stage 1 is processing - Segment 2, sub-block 1. AND stage 2 is processing - Segment 1, sub-block 2. ... And so-on

Checkout the complete pipeline operation and space time table.

Pipeline Processing.

So with pipeline we can implement hardware efficiently. 

To calculate speed up in execution time follow following formula:-

Non - pipelined
Time to process 1 segment = t
No of segments = n
Time Without pipeline = nt

Pipelined
Time to process 1 segment = t
No of segments = n
Number of sub-blocks for each segment = k

Time to process each sub-block = t/n
Time With pipeline = (n+k-1)t/n

In our example:- n = 4, t = 5, k = 5 
Non- Pipeline = 4*5 = 20

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Verilog Tutorial.

LTE Tutorial.

Memory Tutorial.

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