A Practical Guide to Analog Behavioral Modeling for IC System Design

This text presents a methodology for abstracting an IC system so that the designer can gain a macroscopic view of how sub-systems interact, as well as verify system functionality in various applications before committing to a design. This will prevent problems that may be caused late in the design-cycle by incompatibilities between the individual blocks that comprise the overall system. This text focuses on the techniques of modelling IC systems through analog behavioral modelling and simulation. It investigates a practical approach by which designers can put together these systems to analyze topological and architectural issues to optimize IC system performance. Highlights include: discussions on modelling and simulation from SPICE to behavioral simulators; a comparison of various hardware description languages and a discussion on the effects of language standardization; and an explanation on how to reduce time-to-market by decreasing design-cycle time through modelling and simulation. The book contains: more than 25 building block examples that can be used to construct mixed-signal IC system models and analysis of four different IC systems using various levels of model detail The book is intended for the practicing engineer who would like to gain practical knowledge in applications of analog behavioral modelling for IC system design.