RTL Design is an essential step in the creation of complex integrated circuits. It involves creating a digital circuit representation using a hardware description language (HDL), such as Verilog or VHDL, that represents the behaviour of the circuit, including the flow of data and control signals between registers and functional units.
The primary goal of RTL design is to create a circuit that meets the functional specifications of the design while maximizing performance and minimizing area and power consumption. This process involves several steps, including specification and modelling, design entry, simulation, synthesis, static timing analysis, and design verification.
In the specification and modelling step, the designer defines the functional requirements of the circuit and models the behaviour using an HDL. The designer must also identify any constraints that must be considered during the design process, such as timing and power requirements.
During the design entry step, the designer creates the RTL design using the HDL. This design includes a set of registers, functional units, and interconnects that implement the desired behaviour. The designer must ensure that the design meets the functional specifications and any constraints identified during the specification and modelling step.
Once the RTL design is created, the designer must verify that the design meets the functional requirements using simulation. This involves creating test vectors that stimulate the design and checking the outputs against the expected behaviour.
Synthesis is the process of converting the RTL design into a gate-level netlist that can be used for implementation. During synthesis, the RTL design is optimized for area, timing, and power consumption.
Static Timing Analysis (STA) is performed to ensure that the circuit meets its timing requirements. This involves analyzing the delays through the design and ensuring that the data is stable before it is sampled by the next register.
Finally, the RTL design is verified against the original specification to ensure that it meets all of the requirements. This involves creating a set of test vectors that cover all possible input combinations and verifying that the outputs meet the expected behaviour.
RTL design is a critical step in the VLSI design process. A well-designed RTL design can reduce the number of design iterations required, which can save time and reduce costs. Additionally, a well-designed RTL can improve the performance and power consumption of the final design. As such, RTL design is an important skill for VLSI designers to master.
On this website, we collaboratively try to create learning resources available, to help future-generation engineers and also working professionals in improving their skills in RTL Design.