Degradable Restructuring of Mesh-Connected Processor Arrays with Spares on Orthogonal Sides

We present a restructuring method to apply a degradation approach to mesh-connected processor arrays with spare processing elements on the orthogonal sides of the arrays. An array with faulty processing elements is restructured by shifting healthy processing elements toward faulty processing elements using single track switches. First, an algorithm which satisfies the necessary and sufficient condition (called a restructurable condition) that an array is restructured so that its logical size is kept is briefly explained. Next, a method that if the array does not satisfy the restructurable condition, its rows and/or columns are functionally deleted so that the subarray with the remaining rows and columns satisfies the restructurable condition is presented. Finally, the simulation results are shown.