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Exploiting Partially-Forgetful Memories for Approximate Computing

Published: 01 March 2015 Publication History

Abstract

While the memory subsystem is already a major contributor to energy consumption of embedded systems, the guard-banding required for masking the effects of ever increasing manufacturing variations in memories imposes even more energy overhead. In this letter, we explore how partially-forgetful memories can be used by exploiting the intrinsic tolerance of a vast class of applications to some level of error for relaxing this guard-banding in memories. We discuss the challenges to be addressed and introduce relaxed cache as an exemplar to address these challenges for partially-forgetful SRAM caches. Preliminary results show how adapting guard-bands to application characteristics can help the system save significant amount of cache leakage energy (up to 74%) while still generating acceptable quality results.

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Cited By

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  • (2023)Approximation Opportunities in Edge Computing Hardware: A Systematic Literature ReviewACM Computing Surveys10.1145/357277255:12(1-49)Online publication date: 3-Mar-2023
  • (2022)Rebirth-FTL: Lifetime Optimization via Approximate Storage for NAND Flash MemoryIEEE Transactions on Computer-Aided Design of Integrated Circuits and Systems10.1109/TCAD.2021.312317741:10(3276-3289)Online publication date: 1-Oct-2022
  • (2021)SEAMSACM Transactions on Embedded Computing Systems10.1145/346687520:5(1-26)Online publication date: 29-Jul-2021
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        cover image IEEE Embedded Systems Letters
        IEEE Embedded Systems Letters  Volume 7, Issue 1
        March 2015
        34 pages

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        IEEE Press

        Publication History

        Published: 01 March 2015

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        View all
        • (2023)Approximation Opportunities in Edge Computing Hardware: A Systematic Literature ReviewACM Computing Surveys10.1145/357277255:12(1-49)Online publication date: 3-Mar-2023
        • (2022)Rebirth-FTL: Lifetime Optimization via Approximate Storage for NAND Flash MemoryIEEE Transactions on Computer-Aided Design of Integrated Circuits and Systems10.1109/TCAD.2021.312317741:10(3276-3289)Online publication date: 1-Oct-2022
        • (2021)SEAMSACM Transactions on Embedded Computing Systems10.1145/346687520:5(1-26)Online publication date: 29-Jul-2021
        • (2020)Exploiting Errors for EfficiencyACM Computing Surveys10.1145/339489853:3(1-39)Online publication date: 12-Jun-2020
        • (2019)FPGA-Based Emulation of Embedded DRAMs for Statistical Error Resilience Evaluation of Approximate Computing SystemsProceedings of the 56th Annual Design Automation Conference 201910.1145/3316781.3317830(1-6)Online publication date: 2-Jun-2019
        • (2018)Approximate CommunicationACM Computing Surveys10.1145/314581251:1(1-32)Online publication date: 10-Jan-2018
        • (2017)Low-Cost Memory Fault Tolerance for IoT DevicesACM Transactions on Embedded Computing Systems10.1145/312653416:5s(1-25)Online publication date: 27-Sep-2017
        • (2016)A Survey of Techniques for Approximate ComputingACM Computing Surveys10.1145/289335648:4(1-33)Online publication date: 18-Mar-2016

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