Product category:
Microprocessors, Microcontrollers and DSPs
News Release from: Cyan Technology | Subject: eCOG1
Edited by the Electronicstalk Editorial
Team on 08 February 2002
16bit MCU is low-power communications
engine
New from Cyan Technology, the eCOG1 is a 16bit Flash microcontroller specifically designed as a low-power communications engine.
New from Cyan Technology, the eCOG1 is a 16bit Flash microcontroller specifically designed as a low-power communications engine eCOG1 is a feature-rich microcontroller targeted at reliable intersystem communications
This article was originally published on Electronicstalk on 13 Mar 2002 at 8.00am (UK)
Related stories
Development kit boosts comms applications
Cyan Technology is now offering an evaluation board and free software development tools for its first product, the eCOG1 communications engine.
Microcontroller gains cut-down TCP/IP stack
CMX Systems and Cyan Technology have combined to put the CMX-MicroNet TCP/IP stack on the Cyan eCOG1 16bit engine.
Using an innovative 16bit core originally developed by Cambridge Consultants, Cyan Technology's new microcontroller offers an impressive ratio of performance to power consumption.
The core, based on a compact Harvard RISC architecture, offers a synchronous serial emulation interface that supports nonintrusive application development, debugging and testing.
To address stringent time-to-market requirements, Cyan Technology also provides engineers with a comprehensive development toolkit, complete with an assembler, verified C compiler, software simulator and in-circuit emulator/debugger that run on Windows 9x/NT/2000.
Further reading
Microcontroller is put to the Sword
The eCOG1 configurable low power microcontroller features in a powerful and flexible wireless communications system developed by PIC now being trialled by the BBC.
Microcontroller gains free TCP/IP stack
Designers working with the novel eCOG1 ultra-low-power 16bit RISC microcontroller and CyanIDE development environment can now download a free TCP/IP stack from the Cyan website.
Environment accelerates 16bit MCU configuration
The latest release of the CyanIDE integrated development environment enables users to configure their design for either of Cyan's eCOG1k and uCOG1m low power 16bit microcontrollers.
eCOG1 has a rich assortment of communications peripherals, enabling it to provide mixed vendor communications and operations.
Using a plethora of serial interfaces (dual UARTs, dual USARTs, SPI and IrDA) with IntAct's 360Mbit/s transfer rate placing it well above its competitors, eCOG1 is able to facilitate modern connectivity demands.
eCOG1 supports a broad range of eight timers, including a 16bit real-time clock timer, 24bit long-interval timer, two 16bit clock generator timers and two general-purpose event counter timers, as well as an extensive range of communications interfaces.
The eCOG1 supports vectored interrupt handling, a fully programmable memory management unit (MMU), a dynamically adaptable external memory interface capable of managing SDRAM and analogue I/O support with an on-chip temperature sensor and supply voltage monitor.
Multiple power-management routines enable developers to turn peripherals and Flash memory on and off as needed.
With 16 clock domains, developers have the flexibility to cut power to any peripheral within the chip and, since the clock is completely static, it can be stopped to further maximise power savings - a feature that differentiates eCOG1 from many other microcontrollers.
"The embedded communications market has come of age, opening up a wide range of new end applications that require high-speed connectivity", noted David Griffiths, CEO of Cyan Technology.
"When developers attempt to solve these problems with traditional microcontrollers, they are forced to compromise power, performance and time to market.
With the launch of eCOG1, Cyan Technology delivers a device that will find its place in many consumer products ranging from PDAs and smart-card readers to intelligent sensors and next-generation Internet-enabled appliances at a price that is appropriate for mass-market applications".
Filling a gap for embedded communications designers requiring low-power, cost-effective systems, eCOG1 delivers high performance at a fraction of the power used by standard microcontrollers.
Using a single-instruction prefetch queue, eCOG1 boasts performance of up to 25MHz to easily handle the 16bit maths that communications applications require.
With a fully configurable MMU and vectored interrupt modes, developers can have available the real-time responsiveness needed for today's embedded communications devices.
To offer developers a foundation, Cyan provides a C compiler, linker and software simulator.
In addition, the eICE debug port allows nonintrusive on-chip debugging of real-time software applications, freeing developers from the typical problems associated with JTAG interfaces.
Developers are able to evaluate eCOG1 in real-time applications quickly, thereby shortening development time and costs.
"The demand for connected devices that are sophisticated, enjoy long battery life and are affordable has exploded in this past year", noted Bill Giovino, Cyan Technology's Executive Vice President of Marketing.
"To meet this demand, we recognize that developers need connectivity solutions that offer high performance and low power, plus easy evaluation and implementation.
eCOG1 gives developers the resources they need to meet the device communications requirements of networked industry and consumer products both now and in the future".
(This was Electronicstalk's Top Story on 7 February 2002).
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