Data and instruction memory exploration of embedded systems for multimedia applications

A methodology for power optimization of the data memory hierarchy and instruction memory, is introduced. The effect of the methodology on a set of widely used multimedia application kernels, namely full search, hierarchical search, and parallel hierarchical one dimension search, is demonstrated. Three different target architecture models are used. The issues of the data memory power reduction and instruction memory are tackled separately. We find the power optimal data memory hierarchy applying the appropriate data-use transformation, while the instruction power optimization is done using suitable cache memory. Using data-reuse transformations, performance optimization techniques, and instruction-level transformations, we perform exhaustive exploration of all the possible alternatives to reach power efficient solutions. The experimental results prove the efficiency of the methodology in terms of power for all the multimedia kernels.