Approximate Full Adder Cells

A B Cin Sum Cout

0 0 0 0
1 0
0 0 1 1 0
0 1 0 1 0
0 1 1 0 1
1 0 0 1 0
1 0 1 0 1
1 1 0 0 1
1 1 1 1
0 1

Sum has 2 errors Approximation 2

Sum = Cout’ for 6 cases

Prof. Kaushik Roy

@ Purdue Univ.
 Approximate Full Adder Cells

Approximation 1

Approximation 2
A B Cin Sum Cout
0 0 0 1 0
0 0 1 1 0
0 1 0 0 1
Approximation 3
0 1 1 0 1
1 0 0 1 0
1 0 1 0 1 3 errors in Sum, 1 error in Cout
1 1 0 0 1
1 1 1 0 1

Prof. Kaushik Roy

@ Purdue Univ.
 Approximate Full Adder Cells

A B Cin Sum Cout

0 0 0 0 0
0 0 1 1 0
0 1 0 1
0 0
0 1 1 0
1 1
0
1 0 0 1
0 0
1
1 0 1 0 1
1 1 0 0 1
1 1 1 1 1

Cout = A for 6 cases Approximation 4

3 errors in Sum, 2 errors in Cout

Prof. Kaushik Roy
@ Purdue Univ.
 Approximate Full Adder Cells
YES!
Can we approximate further? Approximation 5: Sum = B, Cout = A

Choice 1 Choice 2
Choice 1 – 25% accuracy
Sum = A Cout = A Sum = B Cout = A
Choice 2 – 50% accuracy
0 0 0 0
Cout = A eliminates carry 0 0 0 0
propagation – voltage scaling 0 0 1 0
0 0 1 0
1 1 0 1
Sum = B leads to reduction in
switched capacitance 1 1 0 1
1 1 1 1
1 1 1 1

Area savings + Low power implementation

Prof. Kaushik Roy
@ Purdue Univ.
 Application to Image Compression

Accurate Truncation Approximation 5

DCT + IDCT system using

approximate carry-save adders
8 LSBs approximate

Truncation leads to poor image

quality compared to all
approximations

Prof. Kaushik Roy

@ Purdue Univ.
Power savings over accurate case

Prof. Kaushik Roy

@ Purdue Univ.
Area savings over accurate case

Prof. Kaushik Roy

@ Purdue Univ.
 Application to video compression

Motion Estimation accounts for nearly 70% of the total power consumption

Prof. Kaushik Roy

@ Purdue Univ.
Output quality using approximate adders

Output quality for AKIYO sequence

Prof. Kaushik Roy

@ Purdue Univ.
Power savings over accurate adders

Prof. Kaushik Roy

@ Purdue Univ.
 Comparison of different approximations

QUAP = Quality(PSNR2) x Area savings(%) x Power savings(%)

Prof. Kaushik Roy
@ Purdue Univ.