Digital Systems

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The course takes place in the winter and summer semester.

Dates: always on Mondays and Fridays between 10:15 and 11:45 a.m. in WA -1606

Structure: 6 CP, 3V+1Ü, 4 SWS

Contents and goals

The aim of the lecture is the introduction to design and optimization concepts of digital circuits. The contents of Digital Logic (Digital Technology I) will be deepened and extended by more advanced topics.

The lecture deals with the timing of switching networks and circuits, synchronization, pipeline structures, optimization of state machines, register transfer descriptions and the influence of special features of the target technologies FPGA and ASIC on these points.

The lecture is intended for students of computer science, electrical engineering and mechatronics from the 4th semester and with solid previous knowledge of digital logic and computer architecture. It deals with basic design methods for pipelining, control unit design and related structures and their optimization. Basic low-power design is covered as well as board-based design of System-on-Chips (SoC) and Network-on-Chips (NoC).

The lecture (3 SWS) contains integrated exercises (1 SWS). In the exercises, essential aspects of the lecture material are examined in more detail using sample calculations or designs. In a later semester you can additionally learn the hardware description language VHDL in the VHDL course.

Learning objectives: The learner will be able to

  • calculate the timing behavior of given digital circuits,
  • design simple pipeline structures,
  • apply pipeline optimization methods to given circuits,
  • describe and apply retiming methods,
  • represent and explain the structure of state machines,
  • design complex state machines,
  • develop optimized versions of given state machines,
  • qualitatively analyze and compare implementation variants.

Materials

An extensive collection of materials will be provided for the lecture.

All course materials as well as a discussion forum can be found in the Moodle course of the lecture. Please be sure to enroll in this course if you plan to attend the lecture.

Literature: The following textbooks will be used in the lecture.

  • Mano, M. Morris and Ciletti, Michael D.: Digital Design; Pearson International Edition; 4th ed.; 2007; ISBN 0132340437 
  • Katz, Randy H.: Contemporary Logic Design; Addison-Wesley-Longman; 2nd ed.; 2004; ISBN 978-0201308470 
  • John F. Wakerly, Digital Design: Principles and Practices Package, Addison Wesley Pub Co Inc; edition: 0004 (12 January 2006), ISBN: 0131733494 

Proof of performance

Depending on the number of participants, the certificate of achievement will take the form of an oral or written examination. The exact modalities will be announced in the course.