A massively parallel diagonal-fold array processor

Image processing for multimedia workstations is a computationally intensive task typically requiring special purpose hardware, for example a nearest neighbor mesh parallel machine organization. One type of nearest neighbor mesh computer consists of a K /spl times/ K square array of Processor Elements (PEs) where each PE is connected to the North, South, East, and West PEs only. In a torus configuration, there are a total of 2K/sup 2/ PE interfaces. Under the assumption of SIMD operation with unidirectional message and data transfers between the PEs, it is possible to reconfigure the array by placing the symmetric PEs together and share the north-south wires with the east-west wires, thereby reducing the wiring complexity in half, i.e. K/sup 2/ PE interfaces without affecting performance. This new machine organization is termed the Diagonal-Fold Mesh Array Processor, providing equivalent performance to a nearest neighbor mesh with half the wiring complexity for unidirectional data transferring algorithms.<
>