Atmel: New AVR microcontrollers with RF, LCD and crypto processor

Atmel announced four new application specific extensions to the AVR Family.

The AT86RF401 SmartRF processor, combines the AVR with a high performance RF transmitter operating at 250 - 460MHz. It is targeted at cost sensitive wireless remote control markets such as auto keyless entry, garage door openers and home convenience controls.

The AT90SC Family Secure AVR, integrates a random word generator, crypto coprocessor and on chip security to enable GSM SIM card, Internet transaction, pay TV and banking designs.

The new AT43USB351M extends Atmel's AVR family with USB to 6 members. It is the only configurable low / high speed USB controller supporting five end points. It also features an integrated 12 channel 10-bit A/D.

Finally, the new Mega 169 is the first member of a family of devices with integrated LCD controller. Typical power consumption is less than 20uA at 32KHz operation.

Atmel Introduces SecureAVR with 32MBit FLASH

The new AT90SC3232CS-F32M is based on the AT90SC3232CS (secureAVR processor, 32Kbytes Flash, 32Kbytes EEPROM) with the addition of 32Mega-bit of Flash for very efficient and secure data storage. Its powerful cryptography capabilities (Elliptic Curves hardware support, fast DES/TDES and fast RSA processor) are designed to meet Common Criteria EAL4+ security certification. The AT90SC3232CS-F32M is available in a 3V version, as well as 5V, and can be delivered in module form or in package form.

Price in 1000 unit quantities is $20/pcs.
 

Atmel Releases Two New FLASH C51 Micros with USB

The AT89C5131 and AT89C5132 microcontrollers feature 32- and 64-Kbyte on-chip Flash memory respectively and a full-speed USB controller with isochronous and bulk modes.

The AT89C5131 is a general-purpose USB microcontroller targeted towards the computer and industrial equipment markets. It has a keyboard interface, a 1-Kbyte EEPROM and SPI.

The AT89C5132 combines in a single chip interfaces to most major consumer mass storage devices, including IDE/ATAPI for HDD, CD/DVD and CompactFlash(TM), MultiMediaCard®, DataFlash®, Nand Flash or SmartMediaCard®. The AT89C5132 also provides a full range of man machine interface capabilities such as key interface, LED drive, interface to LCD, and a 10-bit A/D converter.

Small footprint and low-profile packages such as MLF/QFN48, SO28, VQFP64 and PLCC52 are available for AT89C5131 and VQFP80 for AT89C5132; both products are available in industrial temperature range. Production volumes are available now. Pricing is $3.90 for 10,000-unit quantity for AT89C5131 and $5.50 for 10,000-unit quantity for AT89C5132.
 

Cygnal Introduces Microcontroller with Dual 1MSPS 16-bit ADCs

Cygnal Integrated Products announced the C8051F060, a mixed-signal flash microcontroller with two ultra-low power 16-bit one million samples per second (1MSPS) A/D converters.  These successive-approximation (SAR) ADCs are accurate to one least significant bit integral non-linearity (INL), and have 89dB SINAD.  Power consumption is only 20mW per ADC.

C8051F060 family devices have a 25MIPS 8051 CPU, 64Kbytes Flash memory, 4352 bytes RAM, and are packaged in either a 100-pin or 64-pin TQFP.  On-chip peripherals include two 12-bit DACs, a 2% internal oscillator, temperature sensor, voltage reference, CAN 2.0B controller with 32 message objects, two UARTs, SMBus®, and SPI® bus.  Prices start at $16.84 in 10,000 piece quantities.
 

Fujitsu: Four New 16-bit Micros with Integrated LCD Controller

Fujitsu  announced the release of four new microcontrollers for liquid crystal display panel drivers that can support up to a maximum of 192 segments (48 segments x 4 backplanes)

The MB90F804-101 and  MB90F804-201 feature 16kBytes RAM and 256 kBytes of FLASH, while the  MB90803S and MB90803 feature 4kBytes RAM and 128kBytes of ROM. All four devices feature a Vcc range from 3.0V to 3.6V, and integrated PLL, timers, I2C interface, 2 UARTs, and 2 channels of Expanded Serial I/O interface. A 12-channel A/D converter can be switched between 8 and 16-bits of resolution. The devices come in a 100PQFP packages and prices are 1800 Yen for the FLASH versions and 900 Yen for the ROM versions.
 

Fujitsu: New 32-bit RISC Microcontroller

Two new models, the MB91F264 and MB91263, are part of the MB91260 series and include 1.2us analog-to-digital (A/D) converters and a 16-bit multiply-accumulate (MAC) unit that performs MAC calculations in 1 instruction cycle (max. 33MHz clock). Other features include a UART, an 8-channel 8/10-bit A/D converter, real time clock and 8kBytes of RAM. The MB91F264 has 256kBytes of FLASH and the MB91263 128kBytes of ROM. The FLASH version is priced at 2000 Yen and the ROM version at 1000Yen.

A third new micro, the MB91302 implements direct memory access for high-speed data transfer. The device offers on-chip interfaces for SDRAM, SRAM, asynchronous ROM (EEPROM, mask ROM), flash memory, and fast cycle RAM (FCRAM). It enables direct access to any type of memory, offering high-speed data transferring, reduced parts-count for simplified circuit design, and cost savings. The MB91302 also provides a high-speed direct memory access controller (DMAC). On-chip memory includes: 4kBytes ROM, 4 kBytes RAM, 4 kBytes Cache. The microcontroller comes in a 144-pin QFP and is priced at 1200 Yen.
 

Infineon: New C166 and Tricore Microcontrollers

The C164SV is the latest addition to the C166 product family. It is optimized for use in multi-phase brushless DC motors and smart drive applications in the cost sensitive white goods, pumps and fans. On-chip peripherals include an intelligent Pulse Width Modulation (PWM) and a synchronized Analog Digital Converter (ADC) that operates autonomously from the CPU. ROM derivatives, for targeted single-chip applications, are also available.

TC1910 and TC1912, the two newest additions to Infineon s family of TriCore MCU-based Telematics gateway/audio processing controllers are targeted at modular and integrated infotainment applications and industrial control applications integrating voice control features. An integrated high-performance audio codex enables speech-processing functions with no external components. Available software packages include Bluetooth stacks and profiles, MP3 decoding, voice processing, GPS processing and others.
 

Intel Extends Line Of Embedded Intel Architecture Processors

Intel introduced the Intel Pentium M processor for communications applications, providing an optimal combination of higher compute performance, power management and overall lower power for use in ultra-dense modular communications equipment.

The Intel Pentium M processor's "low" thermal envelope of 12-25 watts provides high performance processing in ultra-dense equipment. Improved performance and power utilization from a 1MB, power managed L2 cache, coupled with advanced instruction prediction enable the product to operate more efficiently and process data faster for applications such as security, media servers and signaling. Enhanced Intel SpeedStep technology allows the processor to run in reduced power mode, providing energy conservation on-the-fly when application demand is reduced.

The Intel Pentium M processor is available now in two versions for extended lifecycle support. The 1.60 GHz version is priced at $625. The Low Voltage Intel Pentium M processor at 1.10 GHz is available at $257. Both prices are based on 10,000-unit quantities.
 

Microchip: Demo Board for Low Pin-Count Flash PIC Microcontrollers

Microchip announced the PICDEM 4 Demonstration Board for the  PIC12F, PIC16F and PIC18F microcontroller families

The demonstration board showcases many features of low pin-count parts, including Local Interconnect Network (LIN) and motor control features using the enhanced capture/compare/PWM module (ECCP). Low-power operation is achieved with a supercapacitor circuit and jumpers allow the on-board hardware to be disabled to eliminate current draw in this mode. Included on the demonstration board are provisions for crystal, RC or canned oscillator modes and a 5-volt regulator for use with a 9-volt wall adapter or battery, or hooks for a 5-volt, 100 mA regulated DC supply.

Additional features include an RS-232 interface, an EEPROM footprint, 2x16 liquid crystal display, PCB footprints for an H-Bridge motor driver, LIN transceiver, and an in-circuit debugger (ICD) connector for programming via In-Circuit Serial Programming (ICSP) technology and developing with the MPLAB ICD 2. A header for expansion, eight LEDs, four potentiometers, three push buttons and a generous prototyping area are also included.

By connecting the PICDEM 4 Demonstration Board to an MPLAB ICD 2, a designer can develop, simulate, debug and download code to the microcontroller using Microchip s  MPLAB IDE. Tutorial firmware and samples of a PIC16F and PIC18F Flash microcontroller are included to assist the user in becoming familiar with the PICDEM 4 Demonstration Board and demonstrate the unique features of the supported devices.

The PICDEM 4 Demonstration Board (DM163014) is availabel for $129 and includes two PICmicro Flash microcontrollers and a CD-ROM containing sample programs, application notes and user s guide.
 

Microchip Introduces Free "Application Maestro" Code Generator

Available for free from Microchip s Web site, the Application Maestro software manages a library of ready-to-configure modules and allows the user to customize their design parameters before generating the necessary code files for inclusion in their project, saving designers time searching for source code that might be modified for a particular design.

Starting from the Application Maestro graphic interface, one or more of the available pre-written firmware modules (i.e., CAN, SPI, USART, I2C, RTC, ADC) are configured with the required design parameters (i.e., baud rate, receiving buffer size, etc.). With a simple click on the maestro wand button, the appropriate code is generated, which can then be incorporated into the user s project using the MPLAB Integrated Development Environment (IDE) or another compatible development environment.

Initially, the tool will cover general purpose applications and provide modules including UART for the PIC16 and PIC18 microcontroller families, analog-to-digital converter (ADC) for the PIC18 microcontroller family, a CAN bootloader for the PIC18FXX8 microcontroller, a CAN driver for the PIC18CXX8 and PIC18FXX8 microcontrollers, an RTC for the PIC16 microcontroller family, and modules supporting the SPI and I2C protocols in the PIC18 and PIC16 microcontroller families. Future modules will include an ADC module, pulse width modulation (PWM), capture, compare and PWM module (CCP), external LCD, external EEPROM, PICmicro microcontroller with TCP/IP stack, DeviceNet", Local Interconnect Network (LIN), dual tone multi-frequency (DTMF) Tone Generator and decoding.

The Application Maestro software is available from Microchip s Web site: Microchip: New Low-Cost PICkit 1 Flash Starter Kit
Microchip  announced  the PICkit 1 Flash Starter Kit, a low-cost, easy-to-use programmer, evaluation and development kit for the 8- and 14-pin Flash-based PIC12F629, PIC12F675, PIC16F630 and PIC16F676 microcontrollers, priced at US$ 36.

The 3- by 4.5-inch printed circuit board features a USB-powered programming tool for PICmicro Flash microcontrollers that will run on a personal computer. The board's evaluation area features eight LEDs, one potentiometer, one switch and a sample 8-pin PIC12F675 Flash device. The development area features a snap-off prototype board that enables users to connect external circuitry to the microcontroller for quick set-up of an application-specific prototype. Programming the PICmicro Flash microcontroller is provided by the standalone graphical user interface (GUI).
 

Motorola Announces Four New PowerPC Microcontrollers

The MPC533, MPC534, MPC535 and MPC536, feature a PowerPC core, a dual precision FPU for intensive calculations and up to 1 Mbyte of on-chip Flash memory. These new devices offer a reduced peripheral set from other members of the family. Click here for technical details about the MPC533, MPC 534, MPC535 and MPC536.
 

NEC: Reference Design for MPEG-2 Codecs

NEC Electronics announced the availability of reference boards for the company's MPEG-2 encoder/decoder (codec) products. The new boards feature NEC's ultra-low-power µPD61151 and µPD61152 MPEG-2 audio/visual (AV) codecs, which integrate an audio encoder, video encoder, 32-bit V850 microcontroller core and peripheral component interconnect (PCI) bus interface onto a single chip with large-scale integration (LSI). Windows CE and Video for Linux Two (V4L2) drivers for the reference boards also are available.

The reference boards support up to two µPD61151 or µPD61152 LSI devices to conserve PCI slots and provide additional encoding performance. The devices can be used for encoding and decoding and support a full range of interfaces, including transport stream input and output; composite video input and output; S-video input and output; analog audio input and output; and external BT.656 input. The reference boards also can use NEC Electronics' µPD61051 MPEG-2 AV encoder LSI device for additional product development options.

The MPEG-2 codec reference boards are available now at a price of $1,400 each when purchasing the µPD61151 and µPD61152 encoder/decoders in 100,000-unit quantities.
 

NEC: New V850 Microcontroller

NEC  introduced the new V850E/MA3 microcontroller, the latest addition to the company s V850E family of microcontrollers. The new V850E/MA3 microcontroller, the highest-performing device with embedded large Flash and ROM in NEC Electronics 32-bit V850 microcontroller family, operates at 80 MHz and executes 106 Dhrystone1.1 MIPS.

The V850E/MA3 integrates a large number of peripherals on-chip. In addition to its high operating frequency, the new microcontroller achieves its high performance by providing up to 512 KB of on-chip ROM and 32 KB of on-chip RAM.
 

Philips ARM7TDMI-S Microcontroller Family

Philips announced the delivery of  32-bit ARM7TDMI-S processor core microcontrollers utilizing 0.18 micron CMOS embedded Flash process. Optimized for both high performance and low power, the LPC2100 family operates at 60MHz (54 Dhrystone MIPS) and features 128-bit wide zero wait-state Flash.

The LPC2100 family includes the LPC2104 (16kByte SRAM), LPC2105 (32kByte SRAM), and LPC2106 (64kByte SRAM). The devices feature 128kBytes, 60MHZ Zero-wait state FLASH, RTC, Watchdog, PLL, PWM timers, I2C, SPI and 2 UARTs. The package is a small 48-pin LQFP or 48-pad Micro Lead Frame.
 

Renesas: Who is Renesas?

Renesas Technology Corporation is a new company that integrates the former semiconductor operations of Hitachi and Mitsubishi Electric. Renesas Technology offers a full lineup of microcontrollers, memories, multi purpose ICs, application specific ICs and discrete semiconductors based on high-level R&D.
 

Renesas: 32-bit Micros with up to 512kBytes FLASH

Renesas announced six M32176 family models in the M32R/ECU Series of 32-bit RISC microcontrollers for automotive applications. Three kinds of on-chip flash memory - 256, 384, and 512 Kbytes - are offered, each available with a -40 to 85°C or -40 to 125°C temperature range specification, for a total of six models.

The M32176F4 features 512kBytes, the M32176F3 384kBytes, and the M32176F2 256kBytes of FLASH program memory. All devices have 24kBytes of RAM, a 10 channel Direct Memory Access Controller, 11 channel 16-bit output timer, 10 channels 16-bit input/output timer, 8 channel 16-bit input timer and 8 channel 32-bit input timer, 16-channel 10-bit A/D converter, 4 UARTs, 2 CAN interfaces and JTAG interface.

Other features include a voltage down converter that enables operation on a single 3.3 V or 5 V external power supply, making it possible to use fewer parts than with a dual-power-supply system, and low power consumption of 65 mA typ. at 5 V/40 MHz operation, for low-power, lower-cost systems. The package is a 144-pin LQFP. The M32176F4VFP with 512kBytes FLASH and 24kBytes RAM is priced at 5000 Yen in sample quantities.
 

Sharp Announces ARM9 based BlueStreak Production Release

Sharp Microelectronics of the Americas today announced the availability of its 32-bit System-on-Chip, the LH7A400, in mass production quantities.

This 32-bit LH7A400 component combines a high performance 32-bit ARM922T core, 16KB Cache, Memory Management Unit; color LCD controller and 80KB of local SRAM. The LH7A400 enables a process speed of about 220 Million Instructions Per Second (MIPS) yet only consumes 1.33 mW/MIPS. The LH7A400 is a fully static power management design unit with low voltage operation (1.8 V Core, 1.8 V or 3.3 V I/O), on-chip PLL, and low power core, which provides high performance at a low current draw.

The LH7A400 also includes peripherals, such as interfaces to memory media, Direct Memory Access Controller, Serial and Parallel Interfaces, USB, Infrared Support, Counter/Timers, Real Time Clock, Watchdog Timer and an on-chip Phase Lock Loop. The programmable LCD controller supports up to 1,024 x 768 resolution, up to 64,000 colors and 15 gray shades allowing direct interface to STN, Color STN, TFT and SHARP s Advanced-TFT Panels. The LH7A400 also has 80KB on-chip memory.

Additional Features of the LH7A400 include: 8KB instruction cache and 8KB data cache; external memory interface to SDRAM, Flash (asynchronous, synchronous & StrataFlash"), ROM and SRAM; CompactFlash/PC-card interface; MultiMediacard interface; Smart Card interface (ISO7816); AC97 Codec interface; Smart battery monitor interface;
3 UARTs; USB (1.1); synchronous serial communications interfaces; 10-channel DMA; programmable interrupt controller; 256-pin PBGA.
 

ST Expands 8051 Microcontroller Product Line

STMicroelectronics  expanded its recently introduced uPSD3200 family of 8-bit Flash 8051-based microcontrollers. The new uPSD325x devices expand the SRAM from 8 KBytes to 32 KBytes, while the uPSD321x devices, called uPSD Lite, provide 80 KBytes of Flash memory and 2 KBytes of SRAM for lower-cost applications. The uPSD325x, with up to 288 KBytes of Flash memory and 32 KBytes of SRAM rounds off the new offerings.

Based on ST's proprietary Programmable System Device (PSD) architecture, uPSD3200 devices feature dual independent banks of Flash memory up to 256 KBytes and 32 KBytes, respectively, SRAM, and over 3000 gates of programmable logic with 16 macrocells. The 8032 peripheral set includes two UART channels, five 8-bit PWM units, four 8-bit ADC channels, an I2C master-slave interface, supervisory functions such as a watchdog timer and low-voltage detect, and up to 46 general-purpose I/O pins. All uPSD3200 devices feature a JTAG interface to program the entire device. The uPSD3200 devices also support In-Application Programming. Dual banks of Flash memory and programmable decode logic allow the 8032 controller to run from one Flash bank while erasing and updating the other bank.

uPSD3200 devices are now in volume production in 52-pin and 80-pin TQFP packages, with industrial temperature range -40 to +85 degrees C operating at 5.0V and 3.3V.
 

Toshiba 32-bit RISC Micro With 1Mbyte FLASH/ROM

The MIPS architecture based TMP1962 incorporates one megabyte of mask read only memory (ROM) or Flash Memory and 40 kilobytes of read only memory (RAM) along with various peripheral functions in a 281-pin package. ROM code acceptance for the mask ROM version, the TMP1962C10BXB, is scheduled to start in February 2004. Samples of the flash memory version, the TMP1962F10AXB, are scheduled to be available in December 2003.

The controller incorporates various peripheral functions, including 17 channels of versatile 8-/16-/32-bit timers, 24 channels of analog-to-digital (A/D) converters, and seven channels of serial interfaces.

Pricing  in 100 piece quintiles is  US$12.50 for the ROM version and US$28.95 for the FLASH version.
 

Toshiba 64-bit RISC Processor with Ethernet MAC

The TMPR4938XBG-300 features: MIPS based 64-bit TX49/H3 core; operating frequency of 300MHz; four-way set-associative large-capacity cache memory with 32K-bytes instruction cache and 32K-bytes data cache; integrated 2 channel 10/100 Base-T Ethernet MAC; NAND Flash Memory interface;  on-chip 133MHz SDRAM Controller; 8 channel DMA controller; 2 UARTS; three 32-bit timers; AC97 audio interface; and interrupt controller. Package is a 484 pin BGA.
 

Samples of TMPR4938XBG-300 are scheduled to be available in May 2003 at $35.00 per piece in 10,000-piece quantities. Mass production is slated to start in June 2003.
 

ZiLOG Low-Cost, Small Package Z8 Encore! Microcontroller

The new devices, which are scheduled to ship in volume in August, continue to expand ZiLOG's Flash memory product offerings with devices that are packaged in SOIC and SSOP packages with 20 or 28 pins.

The ZiLOG Z8F08 (8KB Flash) and Z8F04 (4KB Flash) devices feature 1KB of linear register SRAM, as well as one 9-bit UART port, two 16-bit counter timers and a 5 channel 10-bit A/D converter.

Like the rest of the family, the new devices feature ZiLOG's high-performance register-to-register based architecture and a fast eZ8 CPU 20MHz core, which maintains backward compatibility with the company's very popular Z8 MCU while at the same time providing more than twice the speed and executing instructions three times faster.

The Z8F04 devices will initially sell for $2.40 each in 1,000s (depending on configuration). The Z8F08 devices will sell for $2.90 each in 1,000s (depending on configuration).