Power and Skew Reduction Using Resonant Energy Recycling in 14-nm FinFET Clocks

TL;DR

This paper introduces a resonant clocking architecture utilizing LC resonance and inductor matching to significantly reduce power consumption and skew in high-frequency 14-nm FinFET microprocessor clocks.

Contribution

It presents a novel resonant clocking architecture that recycles switching power and reduces skew, improving efficiency and robustness over traditional methods.

Findings

Over 43% power savings across 1-5 GHz range

91% reduction in clock skew

Enhanced robustness of clock network

Abstract

As the demand for high-performance microprocessors increases, the circuit complexity and the rate of data transfer increases resulting in higher power consumption. We propose a clocking architecture that uses a series LC resonance and inductor matching technique to address this bottleneck. By employing pulsed resonance, the switching power dissipated is recycled back. The inductor matching technique aids in reducing the skew, increasing the robustness of the clock network. This new resonant architecture saves over 43% power and 91% skew clocking a range of 1--5 GHz, compared to a conventional primary-secondary flip-flop-based CMOS architecture.