The Design of a System Architecture for Mobile Multimedia Computers

This chapter discusses the system architecture of a portable computer, called Mobile Digital Companion, which provides support for handling multimedia applications energy efficiently. Because battery life is limited and battery weight is an important factor for the size and the weight of the Mobile Digital Companion, energy management plays a crucial role in the architecture. As the Companion must remain usable in a variety of environments, it has to be flexible and adaptable to various operating conditions. The Mobile Digital Companion has an unconventional architecture that saves energy by using system decomposition at different levels of the architecture and exploits locality of reference with dedicated, optimised modules. The approach is based on dedicated functionality and the extensive use of energy reduction techniques at all levels of system design. The system has an architecture with a general-purpose processor accompanied by a set of heterogeneous autonomous programmable modules, each providing an energy efficient implementation of dedicated tasks. A reconfigurable internal communication network switch exploits locality of reference and eliminates wasteful data copies

Forschungs- und Arbeitsgebiete des Instituts für Telematik

Dieser Interne Bericht gibt einen Ueberblick ueber aktuelle Forschungsarbeiten des Instituts fuer Telematik der Universitaet Karlsruhe in den Bereichen Hochleistungskommunikation, verteilte Systeme, Cooperation&Management und Telekooperation. Er ist in zwei Teile gegliedert. Der erste beschreibt die persoenlichen Interessensgebiete der wissenschaftlichen Mitarbeiter. Danach folgt eine Darstellung der Kooperationsprojekte des Instituts. Im Anhang finden sich die referenzierten Literaturstellen sowie aktuelle Eigenveroeffentlichungen der Mitarbeiter des Instituts. Der Bericht entstand im Rahmen der Klausurtagung des Instituts in Rothenburg ob der Tauber im Oktober 1996