mcu News - Page 29 of 47 - CNX Software

October 23, 2019October 23, 2019 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 1 Comment

Nordic Semi nRF52833 WiSoC Supports Bluetooth 5.1 Direction Finding, Works up to 105ºC

Nordic Semiconductors had added a new member to their RF52 multi-protocol wireless SoCs with nRF52833 that supports Bluetooth 5.1 direction finding and can operate in a wider temperature range between -40ºC and +105°C. The company also introduced nRF52833 DK development kit for Bluetooth Low Energy, Bluetooth mesh, Thread, Zigbee (802.15.4), and 2.4GHz proprietary applications, and some companies have already announced nRF52833 modules. Nordic Semi nRF52833 Bluetooth 5.1 SoC Key features and specifications: MCU Core – Arm Cortex-M4F @ 64 MHz Memory – 128 KB RAM Storage – 512 KB Flash Connectivity Bluetooth 5.1 @ 2 Mbps/1 Mbps/500 kbps/125 kbps 802.15.4 (Thread/Zigbee) @ 250 kbps 2.4 GHz proprietary @ 2 Mbps / 1 Mbps NFC-A tag TX power – Programmable from +8 dBm to -20 dBm in 4 dB steps Sensitivity Bluetooth 5: -103 dBm at 125 kbps; -98 dB at 500 kbps; -95 dBm at 1 Mbps; -92 dBm at […]

October 3, 2019February 26, 2021 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 22 Comments

NXP i.MX RT1170 Arm Cortex-M7/M4 Microcontroller Clocks at One Gigahertz!

Microcontrollers used to be those cute little things that clock at 8 or 16 MHz, but in the last decade, Cortex-M3/M4 microcontrollers became more powerful with 100 to 200 MHz clocks being quite common. But with the introduction of Arm Cortex-M7 core about 5 years ago, microcontrollers are seriously starting to take over tasks that were previously reserved to faster microprocessors. As I remember it, the MCU frequency “race” started with STMicro STM32H7 in 2016 with an impressive 400 MHz, and NXP i.MX RT crossover processor clocked at 600 MHz a few years later. But with i.MX RT1170 microcontroller, NXP has upped the ante as the new MCU combines an Arm Cortex-M4 core clocked at 400MHz with Arm Cortex-M7 core running at an amazing one Gigahertz (1 GHz). The documentation has not been released and we have limited information, but here’s what we know about NXP i.MX RT1170 key features […]

September 6, 2019 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 10 Comments

NXP i.MX RT106F & RT106A/L Cortex-M7 Processors Target Offline Face Recognition & Smart Audio Applications

NXP i.MX RT crossover processors combine real-time capabilities of microcontrollers with the performance of application processors thanks to an Arm Cortex-M7 core clocked at 528 MHz and more. The performance is indeed impressive as shown by Teensy 4.0 benchmarks, but so far NXP i.MX RT processor targeted general purpose applications. The company has now introduced three new crossover processors designed for AI applications. NXP i.MX RT106F is designed for offline face recognition and expression Identification, while RT106L and RT106A are made for local and cloud-based embedded voice applications. NXP i.MX RT106F Processor Highlights of the processor: CPU – Arm Cortex-M7 @ 600 MHz (3020 CoreMark/1284 DMIPS) Memory – 1 MB On-Chip SRAM plus up to 512 KB configurable as Tightly Coupled Memory (TCM) External memory interface options – NAND, eMMC, QuadSPI NOR Flash, and Parallel NOR Flash Real-time, low-latency response as low as 20 ns Industry’s lowest dynamic power with […]

August 28, 2019 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 4 Comments

AndesCore N22 RISC-V Core Supports RV32IMAC or RV32EMAC Instruction Sets

We covered Gigadevice GD32V general-purpose microcontroller with a RISC-V “Bumblebee” core last week, and I was informed that Andes Technology had recently introduced AndesCore N22 RISC-V “Bumblebee” IP core capable of supporting either RV32IMAC or RV32EMAC instruction sets. A web search did not reveal any specific information about what “Bumblebee” RISC-V cores are exactly, or maybe it’s in reference that many can be coupled in parallel. But that’s just a small detail, let’s check out in some details what AndesCore N22 core has to offer. The RISC-V core is designed for entry-level MCUs found in IoT devices and wearables, and is capable of deeply embedded protocol processing for I/O control, storage, networking, AI and AR/VR. Highlights of AndesCore N22: AndeStar V5 (RV32IMAC) / V5e (RV32EMAC) Instruction Set Architecture (ISA), compliant to RISC-V technology plus Andes extensions architectured for performance and functionality enhancements 32-bit, 2-stage pipeline CPU architecture 16/32-bit mixable instruction […]

August 23, 2019August 27, 2019 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 21 Comments

GigaDevice Releases GD32V RISC-V MCU and Development Boards

A few years ago, we came across GigaDevice GD32 microcontroller compatible with STMicro STM32F103, but with a higher 108 MHz clock, and zero wait state internal flash. The MCU was also a drop-in replacement for the STMicro alternative since beside being software compatible, it was also pin-to-pin compatible. The company is now back with a new microcontroller, but it’s not Arm-based. Instead, GigaDevice GD32V is based on RISC-V open source architecture. GD32V General Purpose RISC-V MCU GigaDevice GD32V is a 32-bit RISC-V general-purpose MCU that targets industrial and consumer applications such as IoT, edge computing, artificial intelligence and “vertical industries”. The new GD32VF103 series RISC-V MCU family features 14 models with the following key specifications: Core – GD32VF103 32-bit rv32imac RISC-V “Bumblebee Core” @ 108 MHz Memory – 8KB to 32KB SRAM Storage – 16KB to 128KB flash Peripherals – USB OTG and CAN 2.0B I/O – 3.3V, 5V tolerant […]

August 22, 2019August 24, 2019 by Siji Sunny - 15 Comments

Qt for MCUs – Qt Announces support for Microcontrollers

[Update August 24, 2019: Added information about expected release date and license] About Qt for MCUs Qt- The well known opensource toolkit for creating graphical interface announced their new release: Qt for MCUs, targeting MCU’s. The new graphical toolkit will be capable of running on devices without operating system. This may be a game changer in the entire MCU world, since Qt for MCUs allows developers to create fluid user interfaces on cost-effective micro controllers. This means we will be able to see smartphone like GUI’s which are running on low-end MCU’s with limited resources. With reference to their press release, assuring that Qt-GUI will consume less power to save the battery life. Qt for MCUs Software Stack While developing any applications for MCU, developers still can use their powerful declarative UI language QML and rich set of ready-made Qt Quick controls. And the C++ APIs, helps the user interface […]

August 14, 2019August 14, 2019 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 12 Comments

Padauk PMS150C “3 Cents” MCU Supports SDCC Open Source Toolchain

Back in 2016, I tried to find the cheapest MCU, and discovered Holtek HT48R002 8-bit RISC MCU @ 8MHz with 1K x 14-bit OTP memory, and 64 bytes of RAM that was selling for around 8.5 cents per unit for 1k orders at the time, and about the same now. But this morning, I read a post about sub-10-cents microcontrollers where cpldcpu details offering of several mostly little known vendors including Bojuxing Industrial, Eastsoft Micro, or Puolop. But Paudauk PMS150C especially caught my attention since price starts at $0.033, or 3 cents, and EEVBlog community has been working on getting SDCC open-source toolchain to work on the MCU. PMS150C MCU specifications: CPU – Processing unit with 79 “powerful” instructions Memory – 64 Bytes data RAM Storage – 1KW (1K x 14-bit) OTP program memory Peripherals 1x hardware 16-bit timer; 1x hardware 8-bit timer with PWM generation 1x general purpose comparator […]

July 13, 2019 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - No Comments

Arm Techcon 2019 Schedule – Machine Learning, Security, Containers, and More

Arm TechCon will take place on October 8-10, 2019 at San Jose Convention Center to showcase new solutions from Arm and third-parties, and the company has now published the agenda/schedule for the event. There are many sessions and even if you’re not going to happen it’s always useful to checkout what will be discussed to learn more about what’s going on currently and what will be the focus in the near future for Arm development. Several sessions normally occur at the same time, so as usual I’ll make my own virtual schedule with the ones I find most relevant. Tuesday, October 8 09:00 – 09:50 – Open Source ML is rapidly advancing. How can you benefit? by Markus Levy, Director of AI and Machine Learning Technologies, NXP Over the last two years and still continuing, machine learning applications have benefited tremendously from the growing number of open source frameworks, tools, […]