Multi-core Processors: Changing the Tomorrow's Network World Order

The trend of increasing convergence over network and consequent requirement of larger bandwidth pose new challenges to the networking world in India. For the kind of bandwidth required and services provided by SPs at present, single core processor architectures are sufficient. But when more bandwidth oriented services will be provided, more processor capacity with more computing power is required to provide high-end services with data intensive applications.

Creating larger bandwidth of network to be able to provide triple play services will require a huge amount of processing to be done. Industry sources say that in the next three years single-core architectures will be running out of steam or hitting the power ceiling, pushing the network operators toward dual core to 8-core multi-core processors depending upon the amount of data required to be processed. So, multi-core architectures are naturally becoming the mainstream solution in the networking segment too to scale processor performance.

When next generation technologies like 3G, LTE or 4G comes into play, multi-core processors will help improving the performance for the high end services, and semiconductor industry majors like Freescale have already entered the arena to help telecom industry unleash the next telecom revolution for next generation services. Whether it is baseband equipments or access equipments like routers and switches, multi-core processors will be required in the near future with the advent of technologies like 3G, LTE, etc.
Multi-core processors have already found place in PC market with biggies like Intel already using multi-core processors. In the embedded market also the trend has caught up with the requirement of large bandwidth for high-end services. In the technologically advanced countries like the US, European countries and Japan this is the trend now. In India also, multi-core processors will help faster processing for next generation services. Higher end of 3G base stations and 4G base stations, and enterprise routers which have to process gigabytes and terabytes of data will require these multi-core processors.

At present multi-core processors are available from the vendors at four different platforms — P1, P2, P3, and P4. For the entry level of multi-core processor requirement minimum two cores are used, but for higher end processing quad cores or 8 cores are used for faster processing depending upon the amount of data to be processed.

Two core processors of Freescale are already on the sampling with some customers for last two months worldwide. The eight-core processors have also been tested recently with customers. Freescale's R&D centers at Noida and Hyderabad are doing lots of research to further innovate on the multi-core processors to help the telecommunication industry to be on the edge while next generation communications technologies are around the corner.

“The manufacturing and design activities are done in India not only for India market but also for the world market with India now becoming an R&D hub. Though India is not yet there at 3G services, Indian telecommunication industry will require multi-core processors as in the other part of the world,” says Vivek Tyagi, Regional Manager India - Business Development, Freescale India. He adds, “Lots of MNCs who are manufacturing in India are exporting these multi-core processor chips to their home countries and other potential markets. We are at the inflection point of the industry and we need now more than ever the multi-core processor chips for next generation networking.”

Optimize Software

At present, dual core processors are available with some PCs, but no application has been optimized for utilizing the dual core. Subind Kumar, Head, Network and Multimedia Business, Freescale Semiconductor India, “Once multi-core processor hard ware is made, vendors need to show the customers how they have to optimize their software to take the advantages of the whole hardware platforms for which the vendors need to have end-to-end software capability.”

With multi-core processors, networking engineers can program the level of processing they require depending upon the level of the revenue generation of the network operators. So there is a definite need for multi-core processors in India. Sanjay Nayak, CEO, Tejas Networks, which is building telecom equipments for Indian market for carriers like BSNL and other players, says, “The need is to move from single core to multi-core processors in networking equipments due to the increasing bandwidth demand. All the equipments manufacturers require programmability to switch over to single core to multi-core up to 8-core depending upon what their bandwidth demands.” This flexibility to move to higher core facilitates the operators to move to next level of processors.

Green Processors

Multi-core processors assumes significance because they deliver significantly greater computing power through concurrency, offer greater system density and run at lower clock speeds, thereby reducing thermal dissipation and power consumption. Freescale decided to make processors which will not consume more than 30 wts even in 8-core processors. While traditional processors require 60 wts during the processing, multi-core processors do not require this much energy conserving lots of energy. Vivek Tyagi, Regional Manager India - Business Development, Freescale India, says, “We consciously looked into the green aspect and committed to offer green processors for the telecom industry. With these multi-core processors power efficient equipments devices can be manufactured ensuring the green telecom. Frescaele has invested a large amount for green multi-core technologies, and in India alone 500 people have been working in R&D.

Kannan@cybermedia.co.in