High-throughput reconfigurable computing: design and implementation of an IDEA encryption cryptosystem on the SRC-6E reconfigurable computer

The combination of traditional microprocessors workstations and hardware-reconfigurable field programmable gate arrays (FPGAs) has developed a new class of workstations known as reconfigurable computers, with several examples demonstrating significant speedups compared to standalone PC workstations alone. Several platforms implement PC-FPGA communication using common PC peripheral interface buses such as PCI-X. A new approach from SRC Computers implements a highspeed communication interface that increases the throughput compared to PCI interfaces. This paper demonstrates an efficient high-throughput implementation of IDEA encryption using the SRC platform. SRC design choices that influence both throughput and area are evaluated. Detailed analyses of FPGA resource utilizations, data transfer and reconfiguration overheads for the SRC system are provided, and a comparison between SRC and a public domain software implementation of IDEA are given.