Large multipliers with fewer DSP blocks

Recent computing-oriented FPGAs feature DSP blocks including small embedded multipliers. A large integer multiplier, for instance for a double-precision floating-point multiplier, consumes many of these DSP blocks. This article studies three non-standard implementation techniques of large multipliers: the Karatsuba-Ofman algorithm, nonstandard multiplier tiling, and specialized squarers. They allow for large multipliers working at the peak frequency of the DSP blocks while reducing the DSP block usage. Their overhead in term of logic resources, if any, is much lower than that of emulating embedded multipliers. Their latency overhead, if any, is very small. Complete algorithmic descriptions are provided, carefully mapped on recent Xilinx and Altera devices, and validated by synthesis results.

• Type: Conference
• Year: 2009
• Where: FPL
• Authors: Florent de Dinechin, Bogdan Pasca
• Keywords: Dsp Block, Embedded Multipliers, FPL 2009, Hardware, Large Multipliers