From ASICs to SOCs: A Practical Approach

5.2. Power Dissipation

Power in electronic devices is defined as the conversion of electrical energy of power supply to heat. Equation 5.1 represents the power dissipation in electric circuits.

Equation 5.1

Where:

V = Voltage (Joules/Coulomb or Volts)

I = Current (Coulombs/Sec or Amperes)

P = Power (Joules/Sec or Watts)

Now let's look at dissipation in Complementary Metal Oxide Semiconductor (CMOS) devices. CMOS technology is the best choice for low-power designs because of its insignificant static power dissipation. However, simply selecting CMOS technology should not be considered as the only method for reducing power in ASIC/SOC devices.