From Markus Levy
President

EEMBC BenchPress
January 2017

BenchPress

Topics

  • Debunking Datasheets and Optimizing for ULPBench
  • STMicroelectronics’ Video Explaining ULPBench
  • Renesas RX65N CoreMark Results Highlight Compiler Efficiency
  • Myths About Embedded Benchmarking?
  • On-Location with EEMBC
  • EEMBC Expands its In-house Testing Services

Debunking Ultra-Low Power and Optimizing for ULPBench

To ensure consistency in our measurements, the EEMBC ULPBench specification restricts microcontroller operation to a 3V supply voltage, and hence, this is the voltage that is generated by the EEMBC EnergyMonitor. On the other hand, we allow the use of a DC-DC converter to optimize the input voltage (check out this report, for example); generally yielding significantly better results. Furthermore, most ULPBench measurements are performed at best case ambient temperatures (approximately 25 degrees C) - again to ensure a consistent environment. Obviously, energy conditions worsen as the temperature goes up.
Frank Riemenschneider, editor-in-chief of DESIGN&ELEKTRONIK, set out to observe the ‘real-world’ behaviors of a wide range of microcontrollers from Ambiq Micro, Atmel, Microchip, NXP, Silicon Labs, and Texas Instruments. His report is based on extensive testing using different input voltages and temperatures. Read the original version or the translated version.

STMicroelectronics’ Video Explains ULPBench

STMicroelectronics has produced a video explaining the basics of EEMBC ULPBench (starting at the 1:24 mark). Ok, I admit there is definitely marketing in there and the narrator sounds like a robot, but the video presents some interesting energy data (most of which hasn’t been certified by the EEMBC Technology Center).

Renesas RX65N CoreMark Results Highlight Compiler Efficiency

Not many microcontroller or processor vendors develop their own compilers these days. Renesas is one exception, and they do a decent job at it, at least judging by their recent EEMBC CoreMark results. The CoreMark benchmark has been out since 2009, so what makes this more interesting is that compiler guys (including IAR, Green Hills, and even GCC) are still finding ways to make it go faster (and still be applying legitimate modifications that will benefit real-world applications). These compiler improvements for the recent scores came about by Renesas engineers who are quite familiar with the RX CPU’s architecture (dual-issue pipeline, DSP instructions, no wait states on Flash) yielding a score of 4.62 and 4.34 CoreMark/MHz at 50MHz and 120MHz, respectively.

Myths About Embedded Benchmarking?

“Benchmarks are not representative of real-world applications.” “Benchmarking security for IoT applications is impossible.” Are these truthful statements or myths? Read the article “11 Myths About Embedded Benchmarking” and find out the answer.

It’s not a myth that I thank the following individuals for contributing to this article - Mark Wallis (system architect at STMicroelectronics), Dave Edwards (founder and CEO of Somnium Technologies), Troy Vackar (manager, applications engineering at Ambiq Micro), Joseph Yiu (senior embedded technology manager at ARM), Rajiv Adhikary (senior software engineer at Analog Devices), Brent Wilson (director of applications engineering at Silicon Labs), Xiaoning Qi (CEO of C-Sky), Ruud Derwig (senior architect at Synopsys), and Paul Teich (principal analyst at TIRIAS Research)

On Location With EEMBC

EEMBC@Linley Cloud Hardware Conference 2017

EEMBC will exhibit at this one-day conference, covering system design for cloud computing and networking. February 8, 2017. Hyatt Regency Hotel, Santa Clara, CA. Free registration for qualified attendees.

EEMBC@Embedded World 2017

EEMBC and partners will deliver some exciting presentations at the 2017 Embedded World Conference, taking place from March 14-16 in Nuremberg, Germany. The biggest and best embedded event on the planet.

  1. “Heterogeneous Computing Architecture Performance and Optimization for ADAS and Mobile Imaging Applications”. Presented by Rafal Malewski (NXP) and Markus Levy (EEMBC) on March 15 from 16:30 - 17:00.
  2. “Paving the Road to IoT Interoperability”. Presented by Rob Oshana (NXP) and Markus Levy (EEMBC) on March 14 from 10:00 - 10:30.
  3. “Hands-on Workshop - Ultra Low Power”. Presented by Herman Roebbers (Altran) on March 15 from 10:30 - 17:30.

EEMBC Expands its In-house Testing Services

The EEMBC Technology Center benchmark testing services include porting the benchmarks to the target platform(s), running the benchmarks and reporting scores, comparing different hardware platforms and different hardware configurations, and comparing different tool chains and different optimization options. Read more…


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