SABSA: SWITCHING-ACTIVITY-BASED STATE ASSIGNMENT

Many algorithms have been proposed for the state assignment of Finite-State Machines. The usual goal of these algorithms is to reduce the area required to implement these machines. This paper discusses SABSA, an algorithm whose goal is to reduce the number of state bit transitions in the operating environment. SABSA does this by considering measured transition probabilities between states. When combined with a technology such as CMOS, this leads to lower power consumption. A RISC controller was taken from high level design to transistor level layout, and a power reduction of 35% was obtained with this new state assignment algorithm.