Product category:
Communications ICs (Wireless)
News Release from: Texas Instruments (April 2006-) | Subject: MSP430 wireless chipsets
Edited by the Electronicstalk Editorial
Team on 28 November 2007
Chipset cuts power for asset location
The InnerWireless Vision Platform operates within building networks of hospitals, hotels, factories and other targeted industries to achieve a combination of RTLS affordability and ease of use.
InnerWireless is using TI's MSP430 microcontroller-based wireless chipsets in its real-time location systems Based on 802.15.4 RF transmissions and Zigbee protocols, the InnerWireless Vision Platform operates within building networks of hospitals, hotels, factories and other targeted industries to achieve a combination of RTLS affordability and ease of use
This article was originally published on Electronicstalk on 4 Apr 2006 at 8.00am (UK)
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"The InnerWireless RTLS solution is easy to implement and readily adaptable to a variety of industries", says James McCoy, Chief Technology Officer and Senior Vice President, InnerWireless.
"TI's ultra-low-power MSP430 MCU and single-chip RF transceiver enabled us to develop this 802.15.4 product quickly, while achieving our goals of low-cost tags with long battery life".
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In hospitals nationwide, medical equipment from wheelchairs to heart monitors are moved continually, making it difficult to locate these items when needed.
In fact, hospitals often over-purchase to compensate for missing equipment, and each employee wastes approximately 30 minutes per day searching for equipment - leading to unnecessary expenses and increased patient safety risks.
To address this issue, InnerWireless can track equipment and other items to the area in which an item is located by using RF technology based on the IEEE802.15.4 wireless standard and Zigbee-like protocols for RF communications.
InnerWireless 802.15.4 systems comprise three networked components: beacons, tags and master radios.
Rooms equipped with battery-operated beacons the size of a smoke detector broadcast unique identification signals that are received by tags.
The tags, sized to attach unobtrusively to objects and collect location information from the beacons, periodically retransmit this information to the master radio; real-time results are displayed through Web-based applications for personnel.
The TI chipset used in all this product's components combines an MSP430F155 MCU with a CC2420 802.15.4 transceiver to handle all the processing and communication needed for wireless RTLS tracking.
The MSP430 MCU features a stand-by power consumption of 0.8uA and wakes up in less than 1us to an active mode of 250uA (1MHz).
The combination of the MSP430 MCU's extremely low-power standby current with an instant-on active mode and fully synchronised, high-speed system clock enables the trend toward smaller, lower-cost applications.
Additionally, the CC2420 transceiver from TI's low-power RF group provides the industry's first single-chip 802.15.4 solution, supporting quick design for this low-bandwidth standard.
The combined MCU and transceiver saves costs and space while allowing InnerWireless beacons and tags to operate reliably for up to seven years without a battery change or recharge.
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