3DL-PIM: A Look-Up Table Oriented Programmable Processing in Memory Architecture Based on the 3-D Stacked Memory for Data-Intensive Applications

Memory-centric computing systems have demonstrated superior performance and efficiency in memory-intensive applications compared to state-of-the-art CPUs and GPUs. 3-D stacked DRAM architectures unlock higher I/O data bandwidth than the traditional 2-D memory architecture and therefore are better suited for incorporating memory-centric processors. However, merely integrating high-precision ALUs in the 3-D stacked memory does not ensure an optimized design since such a design can only achieve a limited utilization of the internal bandwidth of a memory chip and limited operational parallelization. To address this, we propose 3DL-PIM, a 3-D stacked memory-based Processing in Memory (PIM) architecture that locates a plurality of Look-up Table (LUT)-based low-footprint Processing Elements (PE) within the memory banks in order to achieve high parallel computing performance by maximizing data-bandwidth utilization. Instead of relying on the traditional logic-based ALUs, the PEs are formed by clustering a group of programmable LUTs and therefore can be programmed on-the-fly to perform various logic/arithmetic operations. Our simulations show that 3DL-PIM can achieve respectively up to 2.6× higher processing performance at 2.65× higher area efficiency compared to a state-of-the-art 3-D stacked memory-based accelerator.