Tiny Flash MCUs promise frugal performance

Atmel Corporation has announced three new members of the AVR Flash microcontroller family, targeting battery chargers, sensor end-points and low-end motor control applications.

Atmel Corporation has announced three new members of the AVR Flash microcontroller family, targeting battery chargers, sensor end-points and low-end motor control applications.

Three new 14-pin tinyAVR products are added to the wide AVR family of Flash microcontrollers.

All three devices are pin compatible, differing only in the size of Flash, EEPROM and SRAM.

ATtiny24 has 2Kbyte of self-programmable Flash memory, whereas ATtiny44 and ATtiny84 have 4 and 8Kbyte, respectively.

All new devices deliver 20MIPS throughput when running at 20MHz.

ATtiny24, 44 and 84 excel in battery-powered equipment due to the inherent low power consumption and three individually selectable low power sleep modes.

The application software can adjust the system clock frequency to achieve top performance when needed, and then slow down the clock during idle times.

Additional power saving is achieved using the AVR power stop system allowing the user to turn off timers, USI, and/or ADC when not in use.

As a result, the ATtiny24, 44 and 84 consume less than 100nA in power down mode.

"We received requests for 14-pin AVR devices by customers who need the unmatched performance and the rich peripheral set of the AVR", said Jukka Eskelinen, Marketing Director for tinyAVR products.

"ATtiny24, 44 and 84 devices complement existing tinyAVR range that now offers 8-pin, 14-pin, 20-pin and 28-pin devices", he added.

ATtiny24, 44 and 84 have internal EEPROM, pull-up resistors and an 8MHz, high precision calibrated RC oscillator, leaving 12 general I/O pins available for application use.

The I/O pins can alternatively work as ADC inputs or PWM (pulsewidth modulation) outputs depending on the application requirements.

Interfacing to ATtiny24, 44 and 84 is made easy by using the Universal Serial Interface (USI), which can be configured to work as an SPI, UART or TWI.

Sensor applications benefit from the internal temperature sensor that accurately monitors chip temperature, allowing reliable system parameter calibration.

A wide range of high performance microcontroller peripheral functions are readily integrated.

The devices include one 8bit timer and one 16bit timer, which can control two 8bit and two 16bit PWM outputs, respectively.

A total of twelve 10bit, differential A/D convertor input channels with programmable gain and a fast analogue comparator allow a wide selection of peripherals to be connected when used in sensor and control applications.

Complete evaluation and debug tools are available for the tinyAVR microcontrollers.

The parts are supported by the professional debug environment AVR Studio, which is free of charge from the Atmel website.

The STK500 starter kit with the STK505 adapter board, which is available at $79, offers all the necessary hardware to evaluate programs and test the capabilities of the ATtiny24, ATtiny44 and ATtiny84.

ATtiny24 samples are available in green SOIC and PDIP 14-pin packages and in green QFN 20-pad package.

ATtiny44 samples will be available in Q1 2006 and ATtiny84 samples in Q2 2006.

Volume production of ATtiny24 and ATtiny44 will commence in Q1 2006, and for ATtiny84 in Q2 2006.

Volume prices for 10,000 units are $0.70, $0.85 and $1.10, for ATtiny24, ATtiny44 and ATtiny84, respectively.

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