An efficient statistical method to estimate average power in sequential circuits considering input sensitivities

Abstract

Power dissipation in CMOS circuits is heavily dependent on the signal properties of the primary inputs. Due to uncertainties in specification of such properties, the average power should be specified between a maximum and a minimum possible value. In this paper, we present a novel statistical approach to accurately estimate the maximum and minimum bounds for average power of sequential circuits using a technique which estimates the sensitivities of average power dissipation to primary input signal properties. The signal properties are specified in terms of signal probability (probability of a signal being logic ONE) and signal activity (probability of signal switching). The sensitivities are obtained as a by-product of the statistical power estimation technique using a Monte Carlo based approach. Results show that the maximum and minimum average power dissipation can vary widely if the primary input probabilities and activities are not specified accurately.