Freescale Device Is Top Performer Among Fully Programmable DSPs Tested By BDTI

Austin, TX - The MSC8144 device from Freescale Semiconductor performed higher than any other fully programmable DSP tested according to a new benchmark report published recently by Berkeley Design Technology, Inc. (BDTI). Freescale's MSC81xx DSP, which is based on the SC3400 core from StarCore, achieved a BDTIsimMark2000™ speed score ranging from 9520 to 11900, using only one of its four SC3400 cores. This result confirms that the MSC8144 DSP offers greater signal-processing speed than Texas Instruments' TMS320C64x+ based device.

The MSC8144 is a quad core DSP that provides top performance and increased channel density for demanding applications in next-generation wireline and wireless infrastructure systems. It is Freescale's third-generation multicore DSP, and the first to be based on the SC3400 architecture. The BDTI numbers demonstrate the significant performance gain that Freescale has achieved using the advanced SC3400 core architecture based on StarCore technology. Freescale's implementation of the SC3400 offers a performance increase nearly double the StarCore based SC140 core currently used in Freescale's MSC8102 and MSC8122/26 multicore DSPs. At its recent technology forum, Freescale demonstrated a video encoding and decoding application using the multicore MSC8144 DSP based on StarCore technology in early silicon form - only one month after the device was released from the fab.

"Freescale is committed to StarCore DSP technology," said Jeff Timbs, director of marketing for Freescale's Digital Systems Division. "Marketplace demand for DSP technologies that provide channel density and support video collaboration applications requires an industry leading core. The outstanding benchmark results generated by the SC3400 provide an independent indication of the processing speed underlying the engine used in our MSC8144 DSP."

BDTI specializes in independent analysis of DSP technology. The BDTIsimMark2000™ is a summary measure of a processors' signal-processing speed. The score is distilled from a processor's results on the BDTI DSP Kernel Benchmarks, a suite of 12 key DSP algorithms. A higher score indicates a faster processor. The 12 key DSP algorithms include FIR, IIR, Vector manipulation, Viterbi, FFT, Bit unpack and control code. These kernels are the building blocks for wireless, wireline and video infrastructure systems that Freescale's MSC8144 DSP enables. A summary of the new BDTI report is available at: http://www.bdti.com/bdtimark/chip_fixed_scores.pdf

SOURCE: Freescale Semiconductor, Inc.