A Whole New Ballgame
Supercomputing on Two AA Batteries

Dr. David Baker
Vice President of Product Development
BOPS Inc.


This talk addresses the challenges of designing high performance DSPs for embedded applications. The challenges in embedded processor design are very different from the challenges of general-purpose processor design which has received so much attention. Traditional benchmarks like SPEC do not represent workloads that dominate the embedded marketplace. Benchmarks like EEMBC better characterize signal processing and media-centric applications within consumer appliances. Many embedded applications demand ultra high performance on problems that are embarrassingly parallel. This performance is not achieved by simply increasing clock frequency especially in environments where energy management is key to success. This talk will describe architectural innovation that provides new levels of performance at decreased levels of power consumption in embedded environments.

Dr. Baker has 20 years of industry experience, including key roles at TI, IBM, Brooktree, Compaq and Equator. His areas of expertise include hardware and software product development in PC graphics, audio, video, imaging, and digital TV. Dr. Baker successfully developed and brought to market many products, and as Vice President of System Engineering at Equator Technologies, he helped to develop a system-on-silicon chip solution for the digital TV market place. Dr. Baker received his MS and Ph.D. degrees from the University of Texas at Austin in 1979 and 1989, respectively.