Generalized Adaptive Variable Bit Truncation Method for Approximate Stochastic Computing

Stochastic computing as a computing paradigm is currently undergoing revival as the advancements in technology make it applicable especially in the wake of the need for efficient reduced precision computing for emerging applications. Recent research in stochastic computing exploits the benefits of approximate computing, called Approximate Stochastic Computing (ASC), which further reduces the operational overhead in implementing stochastic circuits. A new generalized adaptive method improving on ASC is proposed in this work. The proposed method has been discussed with two possible implementation variants - Area efficient and Time efficient. The proposed method has also been implemented in Matlab to compare against ASC and is shown to perform better than previous approaches for error-tolerant applications