Xcelium Logic Simulation Reviews & Product Details

1. Faster than most of the simulators such as modelsim, xst, quartus, riviera pro.

2. Allows to add deepest signals in the heirarchy, which is the most lovliest part about it. It is a critical functionality, I don't know why others have not included it yet in their simulators. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

1. No forcing allowed.

2. Simulation should be completely TB based, else you are helpless.

I would recommend Cadence team to add some sort of forcing functionality. It might lead to timing imperfections, but for a small piece of code that needs a review, writing TB becomes a little waste of time. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

The best thing about using it is that it has multiple options available that makes it different from other debugging tools. I have been using it after using VCS and this one seems more user friendly. It has many option like Trace Drivers Sidebars that shows us the information of the percentage of that logic participating in the mismatch and that cool. Debugging has been at very ease with its features of representing the testbench string in ASCII format and other various format which as a fresher becomes very much useful to know in which mode you are and you are facing the issue that gives kickstart to the debug. The filter options available to search the hierarchy are very good. We can match any string with the hierarchy if it is a dot or slash though these are small small things but I find them very user friendly. It saves the previous 2-3 sessions in tool memory and gives us an option to reopen session again if it hangs while debugging issue. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

The only one thing I dislike the most is it's schematic tracer. Someone would feel it good as it gives the whole hierarchical schematic in the schematic browser but some times it happens that the it shows the nets unconnected which we find as connected if we analyze in the Netlist or DFTVisualizer. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

The debugging features where in one can jump into different debugging mechanism like tracing signal in schematic, or looking for drivers of a particular signal in source browser, UVM debug controls, target expression calculator, ability to control the signals & simulation while the run is going on; etc.

Also the access to checker blocks, assertion blocks help a lot at times to take a look at failures.

All these together make it a great tool for debugging. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

Sometimes, debugging is little tricky when it comes to x propagation, or simulation goes into forever loop.

Being into mixed signal verification, would like to have a lighter dump & faster simulation.

Anyway I believe Cadence is continuously putting in the efforts to achieve the same. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

I like feature where I can look at the source code, also can track signal using schematic. Can trace drivers and loads of a signal with ease.Also GUI debug where I can add a breakpoint and look at each step or intermediate output. It is helpful. I work in mixed signal domain I probing and debugging mixed signal IP/SoC is made easy with the abve mentioned features. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

Dont dislike anything. I have been using it for multiple products and works fine for me. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

Tight integration for various debug such as:

Verilog (RTL)

Gate Level

SV-TB

UVM

Specman

PSS

SVA

PSL

SystemC

DPI etc.

Very dependable debugger, does not crash as often as other similar tools do. Solid look-and-feel gives a very professional tool for day-to-day debug.

Signal search, value find, driver tracing are very easy. Expression builder, bus builder works like charm. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

Sometimes slow - especially on large designs over remote connections. I wish the SHM (the Dump format in Xcelium/Simvision) is as compact as FSDB (Fast Signal Data Base). Also PSS (Portable Stimulus Standard) support is yet to mature. Assertions work well, would like to see an evaluator engine so that we can add SVA on-the-fly and re-evaluate without having to re-run simulations Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

Simvision debug gives the ability to see to UVM class based features in waveform. Also it is easiest to use. Currently best tool in the market. Only able competitor is Synopsys Verdi. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

More educational resources can be put and more vendor support needed. Sometimes loading time for large dumps takes so long time that it seems tool is hanged. But still I haven't found better than this. And also instead of going for so much licensing and cost more open source initiatives needed. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

The tool lets me trace the signals with a lot of convinience. Dumps are easy to handle and quick to load. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

The initial learining curve is quite sharp for a newbie. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

It has multiple tools for debugging the functionality of my rtl design. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

From my experience of using it, i recommend a feature to expand all the grouping signal at once in the Waveform Window. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

Tracing the signals and the feature count the edges is also very handy to count the edges. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

Sometimes it hangs when loading multiple signals or the big wave dumps. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

I like using using the waveform viewing and schematic tracing features.

As a implementation engineer, this is very helpful in debugging different nt DFT issues (scan, memory bist, logic bist, boundary scan, etc. ). Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

There are some times that SimVision debug crashes especially when loading very large designs. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.