Improving EDP in Multi-Core Embedded Systems through Multidimensional Frequency Scaling

Energy saving management in multi-core embedded environments has been a challenge for designers. To achieve energy efficiency, most studies consider dynamic frequency scaling on one hardware component only, such as processor or memory - which will most likely also affect performance. This work proposes the use of frequency scaling considering the three most important hardware components altogether: processors, L2 cache, and RAM; seeking for the best set of frequencies for each one of them to improve the Energy-Delay Product (EDP), depending on the application's behavior. Therefore, this work addresses multidimensional frequency scaling for multi-core embedded systems. By evaluating different frequency levels, we show that the EDP can be improved in up to 46.4% when compared to the standard way that the frequencies are configured.