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In digital design, a multiplier or multiplication ALU is a hardware circuit dedicated to multiplying two binary values.

A variety of computer arithmetic techniques can be used to implement a digital multiplier. Most techniques involve computing a set of partial products, and then summing the partial products together. This process is similar to the method taught to primary schoolchildren for conducting long multiplication on base-10 integers, but has been modified here for application to a base-2 (binary) numeral system.

Contents 1 An unsigned example 2 The impact of signed integers 3 Implementations 4 See also 5 External links

For example, suppose we want to multiply two unsigned eight bit integers together: a[7:0] and b[7:0]. We can produce eight partial products by performing eight one-bit multiplications, one for each bit in multiplicand a:

 p0[7:0] = a[0] × b[7:0] = {8{a[0]}} & b[7:0]
 p1[7:0] = a[1] × b[7:0] = {8{a[1]}} & b[7:0]
 p2[7:0] = a[2] × b[7:0] = {8{a[2]}} & b[7:0]
 p3[7:0] = a[3] × b[7:0] = {8{a[3]}} & b[7:0]
 p4[7:0] = a[4] × b[7:0] = {8{a[4]}} & b[7:0]
 p5[7:0] = a[5] × b[7:0] = {8{a[5]}} & b[7:0]
 p6[7:0] = a[6] × b[7:0] = {8{a[6]}} & b[7:0]
 p7[7:0] = a[7] × b[7:0] = {8{a[7]}} & b[7:0]

To produce our product, we then need to add up all eight of our partial products, as shown here:

                                                p0[7] p0[6] p0[5] p0[4] p0[3] p0[2] p0[1] p0[0]
                                        + p1[7] p1[6] p1[5] p1[4] p1[3] p1[2] p1[1] p1[0] 0
                                  + p2[7] p2[6] p2[5] p2[4] p2[3] p2[2] p2[1] p2[0] 0     0
                            + p3[7] p3[6] p3[5] p3[4] p3[3] p3[2] p3[1] p3[0] 0     0     0
                      + p4[7] p4[6] p4[5] p4[4] p4[3] p4[2] p4[1] p4[0] 0     0     0     0
                + p5[7] p5[6] p5[5] p5[4] p5[3] p5[2] p5[1] p5[0] 0     0     0     0     0
          + p6[7] p6[6] p6[5] p6[4] p6[3] p6[2] p6[1] p6[0] 0     0     0     0     0     0
    + p7[7] p7[6] p7[5] p7[4] p7[3] p7[2] p7[1] p7[0] 0     0     0     0     0     0     0
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
P[15] P[14] P[13] P[12] P[11] P[10]  P[9]  P[8]  P[7]  P[6]  P[5]  P[4]  P[3]  P[2]  P[1]  P[0]   

In other words, P[15:0] is produced by summing p0, p1 << 1, p2 << 2, and so forth, to produce our final unsigned 16-bit product.

If b had been a signed integer instead of an unsigned integer, then the partial products would need to have been sign-extended up to the width of the product before summing. If a had been a signed integer, then partial product p7 would need to be subtracted from the final sum, rather than added to it.

The above array multiplier can be modified to support two's complement notation signed numbers by inverting several of the product terms and inserting a one to the left of the first partial product term:

                                                    1  -p0[7]  p0[6]  p0[5]  p0[4]  p0[3]  p0[2]  p0[1]  p0[0]
                                                -p1[7] +p1[6] +p1[5] +p1[4] +p1[3] +p1[2] +p1[1] +p1[0]   0
                                         -p2[7] +p2[6] +p2[5] +p2[4] +p2[3] +p2[2] +p2[1] +p2[0]   0      0
                                  -p3[7] +p3[6] +p3[5] +p3[4] +p3[3] +p3[2] +p3[1] +p3[0]   0      0      0
                           -p4[7] +p4[6] +p4[5] +p4[4] +p4[3] +p4[2] +p4[1] +p4[0]   0      0      0      0
                    -p5[7] +p5[6] +p5[5] +p5[4] +p5[3] +p5[2] +p5[1] +p5[0]   0      0      0      0      0
             -p6[7] +p6[6] +p6[5] +p6[4] +p6[3] +p6[2] +p6[1] +p6[0]   0      0      0      0      0      0
   1  +p7[7] -p7[6] -p7[5] -p7[4] -p7[3] -p7[2] -p7[1] -p7[0]   0      0      0      0      0      0      0
 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
P[15]  P[14]  P[13]  P[12]  P[11]  P[10]   P[9]   P[8]   P[7]   P[6]   P[5]   P[4]   P[3]   P[2]   P[1]  P[0]

Do not be misled by the minus sign (-) notation above. It does not mean arithmetic negation ( -(7) = -7), but instead binary complementation, more commonly denoted x' (read x prime or x bar) or flipping all the bits. In two's complement to get the negation of a number, you complement the number then add 1, so they are NOT equivalent.

There are a lot of simplifications in the bit array above that are not shown and are not obvious, so I'll try to explain a few. The sequences of one complemented bit followed by noncomplemented bits are just implementing a two's complement trick to avoid sign extension. The sequence of p7 (noncomplemented bit followed by all complemented bits) is because we're subtracting this term so they were all negated to start out with (and a 1 was added in the least significant position). For both types of sequences, the last bit is flipped and an implicit -1 should be added directly below the MSB. When the +1 from the two's complement negation for p7 in bit position 0 (LSB) and all the -1's in bit columns 7 through 15 (where each of the MSBs are located) are added together, they can be simplified to the single 1 that "magically" is floating out to the left. For an explanation and proof of why flipping the MSB saves us the sign extension, see a computer arithmetic book.

Older multiplier architectures employed a shifter and accumulator to sum each partial product, often one partial product per cycle, trading off speed for die area. Modern multiplier architectures use the Baugh-Wooley algorithm, Wallace trees, or Dadda multipliers to add the partial products together in a single cycle. The performance of the Wallace tree implementation is sometimes improved by Booth encoding one of the two multiplicands, which reduces the number of partial products that must be summed.

• Booth's multiplication algorithm
• Fused multiply-add
• Multiply-accumulate
• Wallace tree

• Multiplier Designs targeted at FPGAs