Microprocessors

Demonstrations of automotive technology at CES paved the way for autonomous driving and emphasised the role of sensors and AI in vehicle systems, reports Caroline Hayes. Automotive radar has been described as one of the most significant additions to vehicles in the past two decades. In a 3D form, measuring azimuth (horizontal angle) distance and velocity, radar is used in ...

U-blox is sampling a module that combine LTE-M cellular communication (23dBm output) and GNSS for precise location finding. SARA-R520M10 is the super-set device, combining on-board an LTE-M and NB-IoT IC (v2 of UBX-R5) with the company’s M10 GNSS receiver IC, allowing concurrent communication and location-finding in a 16 x 26 x 2.2mm package. Cellular coverage is global, and the module ...

Renesas Electronics has introduced a 64bit MCU for 5G IoT edge devices and Gigabit Wi-Fi 7 gateways, part of its RZ/G Series. RZ/G3S can stand-by for 10µW, run Linux, and provides a PCI Express interface “that enables high-speed connectivity with 5G wireless modules”, said the company. “Additionally, the device boasts enhanced security features such as tamper detection to ensure data ...

MulticoreWare and Imagination have enabled GPU compute on TI’s TDA4VM processor, adding around 50 GFLOPS of extra compute and demonstrating improvement in the performance of common workloads used for ADAS systems (ADAS). The collaboration has achieved over 100x performance gains when running a stereo block matching (StereoBM) algorithm on the GPU rather than on the CPU on a high resolution ...

ST has issued software for migrating STM32 MCU Find code to more powerful STM32MP1 microprocessors. Increasingly, the latest process equipment, factory-automation systems, logistics and retail technology, IoT devices, and digital signage demand greater host-system performance than MCUs typically provide. ST’s STM32MP1 MPUs address these trends, bringing an Arm Cortex-A7 application-class architecture with more processing power and memory. Users can now ...

AMD is aiming at industrial automation with its latest embedded processor series, as well as machine vision, robotics and edge servers. The series has on-board graphics and “because embedded applications require additional operating system software options, Ryzen Embedded 7000 Series processors include support for both Windows Server and Linux Ubuntu, on top of Windows 10 and Windows 11”, according to ...

Microchip has upped the security of a family of PIC18 microcontrollers by adding a one-time disable to its programming and debugging interface. Called PDID (programming and debugging interface disable), “when enabled, this enhanced code protection feature is designed to lock out access to the programming-debugging interface and block unauthorised attempts to read, modify or erase firmware”, according to Microchip. The ...

Renesas has revamped the high-accuracy analogue front-end in its 32bit RX microcontrollers. Implemented in RX23E-B MCUs, the 24bit ΔΣ ADC, depending on configuration, can now convert at up to 125ksample/s – eight times faster than existing RX23E-A MCUs – or achieve a third of the noise – to 0.18µVrms at 1ksample/s. 24bit effective resolution can be achieved at 3.8sample/s. To go ...

Silicon Labs has built a family of 8bit microcontrollers around its 8051-based CIP-51 core, running at 50MHz. “The BB5 family supports voltage options from 1.8 to 5.5V, allowing them to last for years in the field on a coin-cell battery,” according to the company. “They also come in a variety of packing sizes, from 2 x 2mm for BB50, while ...

Renesas will be using chiplets in its next generation of automotive SoCs, and will add software and tool-compatible automotive microcontrollers. The company revealed this when announcing its 5th generation ‘R-Car’ product range, the first of which will be sampling late next year for cars shipping in 2027. Chiplets are simply die to be used inside multi-die packages. They increase product ...