Intel® Quartus® Prime Pro Edition User Guide: Getting Started

ID 683463
Date 12/04/2023
Public

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B.1.1. Optimizing Settings with Design Space Explorer II

Design Space Explorer II (DSE II) processes a design using combinations of settings and constraints, and reports the best combination of settings and constraints for the design. You can also take advantage of the DSE II parallelization abilities to compile on multiple computers.

In DSE II, an exploration point is a collection of Analysis & Synthesis, Fitter, and placement settings, and a group of exploration points is a design exploration. A design exploration can also include different fitter seeds.

DSE II compiles the design using the settings corresponding to each exploration point. When the compilation finishes, DSE II evaluates the performance data against an optimization goal that you specify. You can direct the DSE II to optimize for timing, area, or power. DSE II attempts multiple seeds to identify one meeting your requirements. DSE II can run different compilations on multiple computers in parallel to streamline timing closure.

Figure 74. Design Space Explorer II

You can run DSE II at any step in the design process. However, because large changes in a design can neutralize gains achieved from optimizing settings, Intel® recommends that you run DSE II late in the design cycle.

Note:

When comparing the results of different seed sweeps with DSE II, changing any of the following variables can cause differences in the compilation results between seed sweeps, resulting in a somewhat different fit in each case:

  • The number or type of CPUs that DSE II uses to perform the seed sweeps
  • Any change to the operating system
  • Any change to source file content or location
  • Any change to the Compiler settings or Timing Analyzer settings

For more information, refer to Fitter Seed.