Techniques to Extend Canary-Based Standby 866868 Scaling for SRAMs to 45 nm and

Abstract

scaling is an efficient technique to reduce SRAM leakage power during standby mode. The data retention voltage (DRV) defines the minimum that can be applied to an SRAM cell without losing data. The conventional worst-case guard-banding approach selects a fixed standby supply voltage at design time to accommodate the variability of DRV , which sacrifices potential power savings for non-worst-case scenarios. We have proposed a canary-based feedback to achieve aggressive power savings by tracking PVT v