A description is given of Hyper, a synthesis environment for real-time systems with datapath-intensive architectures. Hyper uses a single, global quality measure throughout the system to drive the exploration of the design space. This approach effectively merges the allocation of hardware, the application of transformations, and the handling of hierarchy in a consistent way. Hyper's modular organization around a central database also allows new software modules to be introduced easily. The discussion covers behavioral specification, module selection, exploring the design space, transformations, scheduling and assignment, and hardware mapping. Four versions of an IIR filter generated using Hyper and Lager IV are compared. It is seen that layouts generated using Hyper are more area efficient than layouts done using the more traditional methods based on one-to-one mapping or the use of multiprocessors.