Physical Design for Multichip Modules collects together a large body of important research work that has been conducted in recent years in the area of Multichip Module (MCM) design. The material consists of a survey of published results as well as original work by the authors. All major aspects of MCM physical design are discussed, including interconnect analysis and modeling, system partitioning and placement, and multilayer routing. For readers unfamiliar with MCMs, this book presents an overview of the different MCM technologies available today. An in-depth discussion of various recent approaches to interconnect analysis are also presented. Remaining chapters discuss the problems of partitioning, placement, and multilayer routing, with an emphasis on timing performance. For the first time, data from a wide range of sources is integrated to present a clear picture of a new, challenging and very important research area. For students and researchers looking for interesting research topics, open problems and suggestions for further research are clearly stated.Points of interest include :

1 Introduction.- 1.1 The Packaging Bottleneck.- 1.2 MCM Technologies.- 1.3 Advantages of Multichip Packaging.- 1.4 Challenges to MCM System Designers.- 1.5 Overview of the Book.- 2 Analysis and Modeling of Mcm Interconnects.- 2.1 Introduction.- 2.2 Asymptotic Waveform Evaluation.- 2.3 Complex Frequency Hopping.- 2.4 Convolution-Based Simulation.- 2.5 Reciprocal Expansion.- 2.6 Extension to Coupled Trees.- 2.7 Direct Modeling of Distributed Elements.- 2.8 Experimental Results.- 2.9 Delay Modeling of MCM Interconnects.- 2.10 Summary.- 3 System Partitioning and Chip Placement.- 3.1 Introduction.- 3.2 MCM System Partitioning.- 3.3 Chip Placement.- 3.4 Summary.- 4 Multilayer Mcm Routing.- 4.1 The Multilayer Routing Problem in MCMs.- 4.2 Approaches to MCM Routing.- 4.3 The SLICE Router.- 4.4 Four Via Routing.- 4.5 Rubber-Band Routing.- 4.6 Summary.- 5 Performance-Oriented Tree Construction.- 5.1 Performance-Driven Tree Generation.- 5.2 Tree construction based on Elmore delay.- 5.3 Global routing using A-trees.- 5.4 Tree Generation Using the RLC Delay Model.- 5.5 Minimum Congestion Routing.- 5.6 Clock Tree Routing.- 5.7 Summary.- 6 Layer Assignment Approaches.- 6.1 Introduction.- 6.2 Layer Assignment for Ceramic MCMs.- 6.3 Layer Assignment for High-Density MCMs.- 6.4 Summary.- 7 Conclusions.- 7.1 Summary.- 7.2 Open Problems for Future Work.- References.