Efficiency measures for SOC concepts

This paper discusses efficiency measures for the evaluation of high performance systems on a chip (SOC), considering a throughput rate R, chip size A, power dissipation P, and a flexibility criterion F. Based on the analysis of recently published multimedia chips, the paper shows equivalences between the ratio of R over AP, a weighted sum on 1/R, A, P, and a fuzzy multicriteria analysis on R, A, P. The paper indicates the fuzzy multicriteria analysis as generalization of the other efficiency measures, which can be easily extended to multiple cost and performance criteria. Because of the application of fuzzy set theory, the multicriteria approach supports quantitative criteria with a physical background as well as qualitative criteria by linguistic variables. Uncertainties at early conceptual phases are considered by a possibilistic measure, which is based on fuzzy set theory.