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News Release from: Actel Europe | Subject: CoreMP7
Edited by the Electronicstalk Editorial
Team on 25 October 2005
Soft ARM7 core if free to use in FPGA
designs
The CoreMP7 is a soft ARM7 family processor optimised for use in Actel FPGAs, bringing the flexibility and fast time to market of programmable logic to this industry standard in processor technology.
New from Actel, the CoreMP7 is a soft ARM7 family processor optimised for use in Actel field-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs), bringing the flexibility and fast time to market of programmable logic to this industry standard in processor technology Under an agreement announced in March 2005 with ARM, Actel is offering the 32bit ARM7 family microprocessor for use in its products free of licence fees, greatly reducing the cost of entry and increasing designer access to system on chip (SoC) development with the ARM7 family
This article was originally published on Electronicstalk on 1 Mar 2006 at 8.00am (UK)
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Kit accelerates soft core deployment
A complete hardware and software development environment speeds implementation of the CoreMP7 soft ARM7 processor core.
Secure design flow for complex FPGA development
The latest version of Libero 6.3 software provides a secure design flow for integrating Actel's CoreMP7, the soft ARM7 family processor, into Actel's non-volatile field-programmable gate arrays.
Exploiting the benefits of Actel's Flash-based architecture, CoreMP7 will be available for use in ARM-ready versions of Actel's low-cost ProASIC3 family of FPGAs.
The devices are optimal solutions for value-based consumer, industrial, automotive and high-reliability applications.
Allowing low-cost system integration, Actel's innovative business model requires no additional charge for CoreMP7 when an ARM-ready ProASIC3 device is purchased.
Further reading
Development environment helps cut power
Enhancements enable easy comparisons of multiple design scenarios and their resulting power consumption and battery life implications.
Plug-in cards speed specific FPGA designs
HMI and miniature motor control daughtercards enable designers to shave months off of their design time and easily meet the most stringent power budgets.
FPGA family promises more for less
Low-power field-programmable gate arrays claim the industry's best power-, area-, logic- and feature-per-I/O ratios in a programmable device.
CoreMP7 will later be extended for use with other families, including devices based on the recently announced Actel Fusion technology, which incorporates both analogue and nonvolatile memory on a single device to enable a true programmable system chip.
"Actel is living up to its promise to bring the ARM7 to the masses", said Dennis Kish, Vice President of Marketing of Actel.
"With the release of CoreMP7, we are extending the reach of the ARM architecture to include markets that could not previously afford individual access to this technology".
"Actel, in close collaboration with ARM, has combined the flexibility of Actel FPGAs with ARM's industry-standard ARM7 processor family to produce a complete and powerful, yet easy to use, product for every designer".
"The unrivaled security features of Actel's nonvolatile FPGAs have enabled a soft IP version of the ARM7 architecture to be made available in a programmable logic device for the first time", said Mike Inglis, Executive Vice President of Marketing, ARM.
"In addition, the unique synergy between the ARM7 and Actel's ProASIC3 family has opened the opportunity to extend this technology to an even wider range of applications and volume points".
Actel has optimised the 32bit ARM7 to maximise the speed and minimise the size of the processor for use with its FPGA devices.
Operating at up to 25MHz, CoreMP7 is well suited for use in a number of applications, including digital cameras, kitchen appliances, automotive traction control systems, car infotainment systems, robotics and medical equipment.
Actel's CoreMP7 is supported by the large ecosystem of tools and knowledge that currently exists for the ARM7 family, far surpassing the level of support offered by competitors.
Additionally, industry-leading ARM RealView development tools are available from Actel.
CoreMP7 will also be supported by a complete development environment, including Actel's new CoreConsole tool, Actel's Libero integrated design environment (IDE), a development kit and a host of third-party tools.
The ARM-ready M7 ProASIC3 devices provide an attractive combination of price and performance with support for up to three million system gates.
Leveraging the unparalleled security benefits of the Flash-based ProASIC3 family, the M7 ProASIC3 devices incorporate Actel's proprietary FlashLock technology and are virtually immune to tampering, assuring users that valuable IP will not be compromised or copied.
Additionally, the single-chip devices provide the firm-error immunity and live at power-up (LAPU) capabilities that are inherent to all Actel FPGAs.
Implementation of CoreMP7 in Actel's M7 ProASIC3 devices starts as low as $2.75 in 250,000-unit volumes.
The M7A3P250, M7A3PE600 and M7A3P1000 devices are sampling now.
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