Schedule-aware dynamically reconfigurable adder tree architecture for partial sum accumulation in machine learning accelerators

Abstract

Techniques and configurations enhancing the performance of hardware (HW) accelerators are provided. A schedule-aware, dynamically reconfigurable, tree-based partial sum accumulator architecture for HW accelerators is provided, where the depth of an adder tree in the HW accelerator is dynamically based on a dataflow schedule generated by a compiler. The adder tree depth is adjusted on a per-layer basis at runtime. Configuration registers, programmed via software, dynamically alter the adder tree depth for partial sum accumulation based on the dataflow schedule. By facilitating a variable depth adder tree during runtime, the compiler can choose a compute optimal dataflow schedule that minimizes the number of compute cycles needed to accumulate partial sums across multiple processing elements (PEs) within a PE array of a HW accelerator.