
4
Preliminary
7-4
pASIC 3 FPGA
TM
Family
Four Layer Metal CMOS Process
QuickLogic pASIC 3 devices are fabricated on a
conventional high-volume CMOS process. The base
technology is a 0.35 micron, n-well CMOS
technology with a single polysilicon layer and four
layers of metal interconnect as shown in Figure 3.
The only deviation from the standard process flow
occurs when a single mask is used for the amorphous
silicon to form the ViaLink elements between the
metal deposition steps.
FIGURE 3. Four Layer Metal ViaLink
Structure
As the size of a ViaLink
via is identical to that of a
standard metal interconnect via, programmable ele-
ments can be packed very densely. The packing den-
sity is limited only by the minimum dimensions of the
metal-line to metal-line pitch. As a result, pASIC 3
devices typically have four to six times the number of
programmable elements per usable logic gate, with
smaller die sizes, than do SRAM-based FPGAs. Fur-
thermore, the ViaLink technology can easily scale to
smaller process geometries in the future.
Array of Logic Cells
The pASIC 3 device architecture consists of an array
of user-configurable logic building blocks, called logic
cells, set beneath a grid of metal wiring channels sim-
ilar to those of a gate array. Through ViaLink ele-
ments located at the wire intersections, the output(s)
of any cell may be programmed to connect to the
input(s) of any other cell. By moving all interconnect
resources above the logic cells, die sizes are less than
half of two-layer metal technologies, as shown in Fig-
ure 4.
The regular and orthogonal interconnect makes the
pASIC 3 architecture similar in structure and perfor-
mance to a metal-masked gate array. It also ensures
that system operating speed is far less sensitive to
partitioning and placement decisions, as minor revi-
sions to a logic design can easily be incorporated
without re-routing problems, resulting in only small
changes in performance.
Adequate wiring resources permit 100% automatic
placement and routing of designs using up to 100%
of the logic cells and I/O pins. This capability has
been demonstrated on designs that also include a
high percentage of fixed pin placements.
The pASIC 3 logic cell, shown in Figure 5, is a gen-
eral-purpose building block that can implement most
TTL and gate array macro library functions. It is
equivalent to the pASIC 2 cell, allowing easy design
upgrades. The cell has been optimized to maintain
the inherent speed advantage of the ViaLink technol-
ogy while ensuring maximum logic flexibility. Since
the logic cell has multiple outputs, it can implement
one large function or multiple smaller independent
functions in parallel.
The function of a logic cell is determined by the logic
levels applied to the inputs of the AND gates and
multiplexers. ViaLink sites located on signal wires tied
to the gate inputs perform the dual role of configur-
ing the logic function of a cell and establishing con-
nections between cells.
F
OUR
L
AYER
M
ETAL
CMOS P
ROCESS
Metal 3
Horiz. Tracks
Metal 4
Vert. Tracks
Logic Cell Wiring
ViaLink
Amorphous
Silicon
Antifuse
Tungsten
Plug Via
A
RRAY
OF
L
OGIC
C
ELLS