Temperature Control of High-Performance Multi-Core Platforms Using Convex Optimization

With technology advances, the number of cores integrated on a chip and their speed of operation is increasing. This, in turn is leading to a significant increase in chip temperature. Temperature gradients and hot-spots not only affect the performance of the system, but also lead to unreliable circuit operation and affect the lifetime of the chip. Meeting the temperature constraints and reducing the hot-spots are critical for achieving reliable and efficient operation of complex multi-core systems. In this paper, the authors present Pro-Temp, a convex optimization based method that pro-actively controls the temperature of the cores, while minimizing the power consumption and satisfying application performance constraints.