DE LEON , BERLIN M.

CPE401

Discuss briefly.

Requirements that affect design choices in Embedded Systems:

1. Processing Power

There is an increase of processing power demand as embedded systems

improve to satisfy consumer applications. There are design choices
appropriate depending on how much processing power is needed in a
system. An Example would be if a system needs a high-performance
processing power, integrating multiple cores on a single chip will help
embedded system hardware designers to provide more features and higher
processing speeds using less power, thus solving many design problems.

2. Memory

There are two categories in memory for embedded systems, volatile and
non-volatile. Within those two categories, different types of RAMS and
ROM are present. Depending on what memory configuration is required,
speed, data storage size, latency, power consumption, cost, and security are
one of the many things to consider before deciding on the memory
configuration of the embedded system.

3. Number of units

Units are the heart of an embedded system that takes an input and produces
an output after processing data. It consists of two units, Control Unit (CU)
and Execution Unit (EU). The control unit is responsible for fetching
instructions from the memory. While the Execution Unit (EU) has circuits
that implement instructions for data transfer and conversion instructions.
4. Power consumption

Power consumption in an embedded system requires much more work than

flipping off some switches. The right design strategy needs to be
implemented when it comes to minimizing the system power consumption
of your embedded system. Using Deep sleep mode, switch regulator and
powering off unused components are one of many suggestions to minimize
power consumption.

5. Development cost

The development cost of an embedded system will increase exponentially if

innovations are not brought and deployed into the product development
cycle (PDC). This is due to the fact the system complexity is increasing
exponentially with time. This increasing complexity results from
introduction of new protocols, higher radio frequencies, and increasing
number of applications, among others, in the case of mobile devices.

6-7. Lifetime and Reliability

There are three phases of lifetimes and its reliability in an embedded system
and they are:

• Early life – declining failure rate where failures are due to random defects.

• Useful life – the steady state period where failure rate is relatively constant.

• Wear-out – stage where end of life mechanisms starts to occur and failure
rate increases.
References:

https://www.qt.io/embedded-development-talk/memory-options-for-embedded-
systems-how-to-select-the-right-memory-
configuration#:~:text=Types%20of%20memory%20in%20embedded,of%20RAM
%20and%20ROM%20memories.

https://file.elecfans.com/web1/M00/00/05/o4YBAFnLiiuADNMzAAglHgQ300E9
41.pdf

https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/computer-science/processing-power

https://www.elprocus.com/embedded-system-design/