Cadence introduces Tensilica HiFi 3z DSP architecture for the latest mobile and home entertainment applications

Cadence Corporation announced the launch of the Cadence Tensilica HiFi 3z DSP IP core designed for system-on-a-chip (SoC) applications in the latest mobile and home entertainment applications. Applications include smartphones, augmented reality (AR)/ 3D glasses, digital TVS and set-top boxes (STBS), among others. Compared to the previous generation HiFi 3 DSP, which dominated the industry's audio DSP core shipment stations, the new HiFi 3z architecture will deliver more than 1.3 times stronger voice and audio processing performance.

Higher voice sampling rates require more sophisticated voice preprocessing, and the Enhanced Voice Call Service Codec (EVS) is the latest mobile voice codec for 4G HD voice VoLTE, which supports sampling rates of up to 48kHz, compared to 16kHz for the previous AMR-WB codec. The performance of the new HiFi 3z DSP for EVS processing is more than 1.3 times higher than that of the HiFi 3 DSP. A similar increase in computing effort is evident in home entertainment systems, as audio codecs such as Dolby AC-4 and MPEG-H switch from channel-based to object-based audio. In addition, 3D/AR sound algorithms, such as Waves Nx, support immersive sound TV sets with Dolby Atmos, and the audio post-processing capabilities required are driving more complex signal processing. Compared to the HiFi 3 DSP, the HiFi 3z DSP provides over 1.4 times better performance for handling Dolby Atmos-capable TVS.

"The combination of Waves' evolving technology portfolio and Cadence's new generation of highly efficient HiFi 3z DSP cores allows us to continue to deliver on our mission, Bringing cutting-edge Audio capabilities to consumers anytime, anywhere, "said Tomer Elbaz, Executive Vice President and General manager of Consumer Electronics at Waves Audio. "Waves' algorithm runs 20 percent more efficiently on the HiFi 3z DSP. "Combined with our versatile portfolio of audio processing algorithms, this provides an attractive solution for manufacturers who want to deliver an exceptional audio experience to their customers."

The HiFi 3z DSP offers a number of architecture and instruction set (ISA) improvements over its predecessor, the HiFi 3 DSP, including:

● Dual load/store (load/store)

● High level FLIX combination (multiple basic operation instructions per cycle)

● Double 16x16 MAC (8-way MAC)

● Enhanced instruction set for accelerating FFT, FIR, and IIR calculations

● New instruction extensions to improve the performance of mobile application codecs (especially EVS)

● Four-way octet loading is used to improve voice triggering performance

● Eight-way eight-bit loading to reduce the memory required for neural network applications

"In the quest for a better consumer experience, new audio and voice codecs and algorithms for pre - and post-processing capabilities have resulted in a significant increase in signal processing and control code workloads," said Larry Przywara, Director of the Audio/Voice IP Marketing Department at Cadence. "We designed the HiFi 3z DSP to efficiently support these new audio and voice computing needs. The HiFi 3z DSP has already been licensed to users, and its mobile SoC has been rolled out and is expected to be in mass production in 2018."