The design of the MGAP-2: a micro-grained massively parallel array

The Micro-Grain Array Processor-2 (MGAP-2) is a two-dimensional SIMD array of 49152 fine-grain processors designed primarily for high-performance signal and image processing. Each processor can compute two arbitrary three-input Boolean functions, contains local RAM, and has additional logic for interprocessor communication. The MGAP-2 differs from existing fine-grain arrays in that it has a high degree of integration while incorporating processor level interconnect control. Each processor can independently select its communication direction. This allows a programmer to map algorithms onto the array in a more efficient manner than if the processors communicated in the standard SIMD fashion. Also, the MGAP-2's processor level interconnect allows groups of processors to be clustered into larger computational units, making the basic computational units as powerful as they need to be for a given problem.