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Seadog's avatar
Seadog
Icon for Occasional Contributor rankOccasional Contributor
6 years ago

Timing closure on Arria 10

I am trying to close timing on an Arria 10 Design (A057K2F40I2). I would like to know if some of the problems I am seeing are device limitations, or just tool issues or operator error.

The first concerns setup time to I/O registers. Here is an example, from Chip Planner:

The delay from the pad to the register input exceeds 5 ns (see below).

This seems a bit high to me, but perhaps mediocre I/O cell performance is a limitation of mid-priced FPGAs.

The second problem regards synthesis results, and the effect therof on timing. We have a block of 32-bit registers, which can be accessed via a PCIe endpoint and Avalon shim interface. There are about 100 - 150 registers, and a 14-bit address. The readback mux for the register block is failing setup time by a significant margin. I would expect the mux for each read data bit to be implemented separately, and the resulting combinatorial circuit would have fewer than 200 inputs. With 6-input LUTs, it should be possible to implement that logic in three or four levels. But I am seeing on the order of 30 levels:

I have added a couple of extra clock ticks and am using a multicycle constraint, but I am still seeing a bunch of paths that don't make it.

Here is the chip planner view for the above mux:

So is this an Arria 10 limitation? I have tried Prime Pro 18.1 and 19.2, as well as Prime Standard 18.2, and I get similar results in each case.

15 Replies

  • sstrell's avatar
    sstrell
    Icon for Super Contributor rankSuper Contributor

    There could be an error in your .sdc or things like unnecessary multicycle exceptions that could increase routing delay. Whatever the Fitter does is guided by your timing constraints, so they are the first and most important thing to look at.

    #iwork4intel

  • Seadog's avatar
    Seadog
    Icon for Occasional Contributor rankOccasional Contributor

    I can't post this stuff, it is an ITAR design.

  • IDeyn's avatar
    IDeyn
    Icon for Contributor rankContributor

    Hi Seadog.

    In order for the community to help you have to add the archive of your project, it is the easiest way to analyse your issue.

    Timing problems are sometimes very complex, and in your case, it could absolutely unreal to help you without additional information from you.

    If it is a problem for some reason to attach the whole project, you need to create a simple test version of your project.

    --

    Best regards,

    Ivan