If you use software tuned for one
algorithm to implement the other, it's going to be slower.
Yup.
The same will be true with hardware, only more so. I have some
hardware that will do the three loop case 10-100 times faster than the
one loop case. It doesn't matter. It would be easy to build hardware
that went the other way.
This one point I contest. The fastest hardware you can do (all on one VLSI
chip) will show the 3 loop case to be 3x faster than the 1 loop case.
There is no way to design it the other way without artificially slowing
down the individual DES operations in the 3-loop case, beyond what each
does in the 1-loop case.
It seems fairly unlikely that hardware
acceleration is going to be crucially important for PEM;
I don't think it will, for PEM. I'm worried about the precedent we're
setting. It will be very important to others, only they're not likely
to get to the mass market as soon as PEM will, so they're not likely
to set the precedent.
- <<Disclaimer: All opinions expressed are my own, of course.>>
- Carl Ellison
cme(_at_)sw(_dot_)stratus(_dot_)com
- Stratus Computer Inc. M3-2-BKW TEL: (508)460-2783
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