September 12, 1997

WHAT'S HOT IN THE DESIGN COMMUNITY

Open Excel inside 32-bit graphing package

Although several companies offer Excel add-ins to let you create graphs for insertion into technical reports, Microcal Software takes a different approach. Instead of adding onto Excel, Microcal lets you open Excel from within the $595 Origin V5.0, a 32-bit version of the company's technical-graphing software that runs under Windows 95 and NT.

Because you can open Excel from within Origin, you can perform all of Excel's data-manipulation functions from within the graphing package. You need not export Excel files to make them available to Origin. Using Origin to visually modify data can change the original workbook. If your PC connects to a network, you can use a workbook on the network to supply the source data for a series of graphs. Subsequent changes to the workbook appear in your graphs. But if you want absolute control over the source data, you can base your graphs on a private copy of the workbook.

Origin V5.0 also features smoothing, regression, FFT functions, and curve fitting. FFT capabilities include convolution, deconvolution, lowpass, highpass, bandpass, and band-reject filtering. File-import and -export capabilities now offer compatibility with additional programs, including several for data acquisition. V4.1, the 16-bit Windows 3.x version of Origin, continues to be available for $495. Owners of V4.1 can upgrade to V5.0 for $199. The upgrade price for owners of older versions is $299.

--by Dan Strassberg

Microcal Software Inc, Northampton, MA. 1-800-969-7720, 1-413-586-2013, fax 1-413-585-0126, www.microcal.com.

DSP+PCI=1600 MIPS

They say you can never be too rich or too thin, but signal-processing-algorithm implementers know what's really important: You can never have too many MIPS. To meet the needs of voice-processing, modem, and speech-recognition applications, the PCI/C6200 from Loughborough Sound Images puts a Texas Instruments (Dallas) TMS320C6201 DSP on a PCI board, along with 8 Mbytes of SDRAM and 512 kbytes of synchronous-burst SRAM. There's also room onboard for a Loughborough analog I/O module. The board achieves 1600-MIPS processing power and 132-Mbyte/sec PCI-to-host interface speed.

Software support is critical for this type of resource. Loughborough supplies its own development and debugging tools and core-function libraries, as well as tools from Texas Instruments, Go-DSP (Toronto, ON, Canada), and White Mountain (Nashua, NH). Host-communication software provides control, download and data transfer, DMA, signals, and mailboxes. The compiler makes maximum use of the parallel-execution capabilities in the DSP with as many as eight instructions executing simultaneously. The board costs $3000 (OEM).

--by Bill Schweber

Loughborough Sound Images Inc, Lexington, MA. 1-617-860-9020, www.lsi-dsp.com.

PC fan manager takes the
pain out of keeping cool

Often, it takes a disproportionate amount of your time, cost, and effort to provide those small but necessary peripheral functions, such as fan control in a PC. Two ICs from TelCom Semiconductor aim to change that situation. The TC642 and similar TC646 fan controllers let you use any standard two-wire, brushless, dc-motor fan as an intelligent fan. The TC642 generates a 30-Hz PWM signal to provide a fan speed proportional to temperature, as measured by a thermistor or another voltage-output temperature sensor. The IC detects fan faults, such as stalled operation or open circuit, and shuts the fan off, and it sets a fault-indication output. Similarly, when the IC detects 100% duty cycle--signifying a possible thermal runaway or blocked-fan airflow--it allows the fan to run and provides the fault indication. You can use a resistor divider to set the minimum fan speed, and built-in circuitry ensures reliable motor start-up at power-on, after shutdown, or after transient faults.

The TC646 variation includes an autoshutdown feature that suspends fan operation when the measured temperature is less than a minimum that users establish with a resistor divider or another voltage level. Both devices come in eight-pin DIP or SOIC packages, require a 3 to 5.5V supply, and drive the fan with an external transistor, MOSFET, or Darlington pair, depending on load current. Because of the PWM drive, the dissipation in this pass element is low, so small devices in TO-92 or SOT packages usually can handle the load. The TC642 costs $1.44, and the TC646 costs $1.62 (10,000).

--by Bill Schweber

TelCom Semiconductor Inc, Mountain View, CA. 1-415-968-9241, www.telcom-semi.com.

Bank-switchable SRAMs provide
multiport memory alternative

Integrated Device Technology's new bank-switchable, dual-port SRAMs take a middle ground between standard and true dual-port SRAMs in both features and price and offer benefits over multichip alternatives that implement the same function. Dual-port SRAMs are ideal when two system hosts need to read and write the same memory device simultaneously. However, the multiple I/O buses and on-chip logic to arbitrate between simultaneous accesses to the same byte or word make true dual-port SRAM more expensive than standard single-port asynchronous SRAMs.

IDT's 512-kbit and 1-Mbit SRAMs internally subdivide into four or eight banks, which you can selectively and dynamically assign to the two ports, each with dedicated address, data, and control pins. Bank assignments occur either by an external-control option of driving input pins high or low or by a semaphore-control option of using command requests and internally processed bank arbitration. In the semaphore-control scheme, the "winning" host receives a maskable interrupt to confirm that the memory granted the port's bank-allocation request. Both bank-assignment options also provide on-chip mailboxes for interhost communication and per-port, 8- or 16-bit-wide bus control.

For applications that simultaneously transfer large packets of information from one port to another, the eight-bank, semaphore-control or four-bank, external-control granularity may be sufficiently small to ensure high-efficiency memory usage without incurring the cost of a true dual-port SRAM. As an integrated alternative to separate standard SRAM, multiple transceivers and reconfigurable address decoders, bank-switchable, dual-port SRAMs also offer corresponding power, board-space, and reliability advantages. Access times as fast as 15 nsec for IDT's memories mean that a multichip alternative would need less-than-10-nsec SRAMs to overcome external-logic propagation delays and offer similar performance.

The external-bank-select, 1-Mbit, 5V IDT707288 and 512-kbit, 5V IDT707278, both in 100-pin TQFPs, are available for sampling at $29.95 (10,000) and $19.95 (10,000), respectively for the 25-nsec speed. IDT plans production in the fourth quarter of this year. IDT plans to provide 3.3V versions of both parts for prototyping by the end of the third quarter. Semaphore-controlled, bank-switchable, dual-port SRAMs should also appear by the end of the year at prices equal to their external-bank-select counterparts.

--by Brian Dipert

Integrated Device Technology Inc, Santa Clara, CA. 1-408-727-6116, fax 1-408-492-8674, www.idt.com.

Paperless chart recorder
expands to 128 channels

IOtech's ChartScan/1400 acquires data from more analog signal sources at higher speeds than most other chart recorders can. The unit, which takes as many as 147 samples/sec, works with an external PC, which runs the Windows-based software. The unit occupies about as much room on a work surface as a notebook PC and is about as tall as a notebook PC whose display is upright. The basic master unit houses one to four 16-channel plug-in data-acquisition modules. You can stack the master unit on top of an equal-sized slave chassis that takes its power from the master and can house four additional plug-ins. The master unit provides 32 TTL alarm or annunciator outputs.

The company offers five types of plug-ins. One, for thermocouples uses mini-plug connectors. Three otherwise-identical, voltage-measurement modules offer screw-terminal, BNC, or safety-jack connectors. A high-voltage module also uses safety jacks. Channel-to-channel isolation is 500V on all plug-ins except the thermocouple module, on which it is 200V. Prices range from $2690 for a 16-channel configuration to $8450 for a 128-channel configuration.

--by Dan Strassberg

IOtech Inc, Cleveland, OH. 1-216-439-4091, fax 1-216-439-4093, sales@iotech.com, www.iotech.com.

VCXOs deliver psec edges for SONET systems

Series W2901 and M2901 VCXOs (voltage-controlled oscillators) from MF Electronics deliver clock and data-recovery signals with 225-psec rise and fall times for SONET applications. The ECL-compatible complementary outputs have nearly perfect (48 to 52%) symmetry for driving differential lines. The VCXOs are available in the 15- to 75-MHz range and offer a choice of ±50-, ±100-, or ±150-ppm capture span. Center-frequency stability is ±20 ppm with respect to load, supply-voltage, and 0 to 70°C temperature variations. Maximum jitter is 100 psec p-p.

The W2901 comes in a hermetically sealed DIP that measures 0.8×0.98×0.275 in. The M2901 comes in a 0.5×0.8×0.2-in. DIP. Both VCXOs cost $55 in 1000-pc lots.

--by Bill Travis

MF Electronics Corp, New Rochelle, NY, 1-800-331-1236, fax 1-914-576-6204, www.mfelectronics.com.

MOSFET helps systems grapple with Ohm's law

There's no avoiding the basics of V=IR, even in the power-management subsystems of the latest consumer products, such as camcorders and cellular phones. Motorola's family of MOSFETs, in space-saving, three-pin SOT-23 packages, offers a variety of p- and n-channel devices for load switching, dc/dc converters, and functions. Using a high-cell-density process, the n-type MGSF1N02LT1, for example, has R_DS(ON) of 0.085 ohms at 10V and 0.125 ohms at 4.5V. The 20V device costs $0.16 (100,000).

--by Bill Schweber

Motorola Semiconductor Products Sector, Phoenix, AZ. 1-602-244-5902, fax 1-602-244-5406, www.mot-sps.com/sps/general/about.html.

Get "expert" help to locate
pc-board EMI problems

Quiet Expert from Viewlogic helps you find and provides advice on fixing EMI-board problems. Excessive EMI results from design deficiencies, such as clock noise coupled to I/O lines, signal traces over ground-plane gaps, and poor connector or heat-sink placement. The tool uses default models and includes an electromagnetic-compatibility (EMC) design-rule checker. You can also customize the design rules for designs or applications.

Using a fast EMI-estimation engine, Quiet Expert locates EMI-induced difficulties and presents results in a spreadsheet format, sorted by the EMI mechanism. You also have a graphical display that highlights problem components and board traces on the board layout as you highlight them on the spreadsheet. After Quiet Expert advises you on how to fix problems, you make changes and then rerun an EMI analysis to see if you've corrected the problems. You can also couple Quiet Expert's database to Quiet, Viewlogic's EMC-analysis and -simulation tool, for detailed EMI analysis and information.

Quiet Expert and Quiet run on Unix-based platforms. Quiet Expert will be in production in the fourth quarter and costs $30,000. Quiet is available now for $99,000. A Windows version of Quiet Expert will be available late this year or early in 1998.

--by Jim Lipman

Viewlogic Systems, Camarillo, CA. 1-805-988-8250, fax 1-805-988-8259, www.viewlogic.com.

7.4-lb notebook packs 200-MHz UltraSPARC

Designers that are wed to their SPARC workstations but need the mobility of their notebook-PC-carrying counterparts can now turn to RDI Computer for a full-featured notebook UltraSPARC system. The company's 7.4-lb UltraBook offers as much as 512 Mbytes of memory, 9 Gbytes of disk storage, and a 12.1- or 14.1-in., active-matrix LCD. The 14.1-in., 1024×768-pixel display provides about the same viewable area as a standard 17-in. CRT. Customers can specify a 167- or 200-MHz UltraSPARC CPU. The unit comes standard with an ATI (Thornhill, ON, Canada) 3D Rage LT graphics accelerator and optionally with Sun Microsystems' (Mountain View, CA) Creator Graphics 3-D accelerator.

The 2.3×12.4×11.66-in. notebook packs as many as three 2.5-in. disk drives, a Li-ion battery, dual Type II PC-card slots, 10/100-Mbps Ethernet interface, Fast/Wide SCSI, and standard PC serial and parallel interfaces. You can connect an external floppy drive. A docking bay that bolts securely under the UltraBook offers three more slots for disk drives or extra batteries, can support a CD-ROM, and includes a full PCI-bus slot. The system runs standard, unmodified Solaris 2.5.1 or 2.6 and is compatible with Sun workstations. A configuration with a 167-MHz CPU, 32 Mbytes of memory, and a 3-Gbyte disk costs $11,995.

--by Maury Wright

RDI Computer Corp, Carlsbad, CA. 1-760-929-0992, www.rdi.com.

"Cafeteria-style" chip process
feeds true systems on chips

Lucent Technologies' new modular chip-fabrication technology allows you to add modules to a base process to implement specialized circuit blocks. The new 0.25-µm CMOS-based process provides five metal-interconnect layers and lets you run chips at 300 MHz.

You can add four enhancement modules in any combination to the base process. A precision analog module with low-threshold transistors and a precision-capacitor structure give you improved voltage linearity and easier component matching for differential circuits. You can use a BiCMOS module with 35-GHz transistor capability for RF and linear circuits. An SRAM module provides high-density, fast-access SRAM array capability. A flash-memory process module targets nonvolatile storage applications.

Lucent's 0.25-µm ASIC family includes the HL250C and LV-250C standard-cell libraries for 3.3 and 2.5V operation, respectively. You can mix cells from both libraries to implement 3.3 and 2.5 blocks on a chip. Lucent's Silicon Suite products also let you add mixed-signal macrocells and a range of communication cores. The HL250C and LV250C ASIC products are in beta test and will be available this December. Chip NRE charges will start at $190,000, depending on design complexity and the number of chips you need.

--by Jim Lipman

Lucent Technologies, Allentown, PA. 1-800-372-2447, fax 1-610-712-4106, www.lucent.com.

High-efficiency PCS power
amp cuts package size

Operating from a 4.8V supply, the AWT1902 power amplifier from Anadigics comes in a 16-pin SSOP--half the size of comparable devices in SSOP-28s. The RF amp for PCS1900 and DCS1800 applications using GSM (Global System for Mobile communication)-modulation format typically provides 32-dBm output power at 45% efficiency; nominal input power is 7 dBm. You can set the output power and efficiency point using one capacitor. Noise generated by the device in the receive band is less than ­80 dBm in a 100-kHz bandwidth. The GaAs monolithic-microwave IC costs $7.25 (100,000).

--by Bill Schweber

Anadigics Inc, Warren, NJ. 1-617-668-5000, fax 1-908-668-5132, www.Anadigics.com.

High-voltage power MOSFETs
target RF applications

Two RF power MOSFETs from Advanced Power Technology come in common-source, plastic TO-247 packages with mirror-image pinouts. This pinout configuration allows for easy pc-board layout for push-pull output stages. The ARF446 and ARF447 are capable of 250V operation, and each can deliver 250W RF power. They spec 15-dB gain and 70% efficiency for 40.68 MHz, Class-C operation. The high-voltage capability of the devices eliminates the need for a dc/dc converter in RF systems. The MOSFETs cost $31.51 (100).

--by Bill Travis

Advanced Power Technology, Bend, OR. 1-541-382-8028, fax 1-541-388-0364, www.advancedpower.com.

Reader Needs Your Help

I would appreciate any help that readers can offer in locating:

• The US sales office for NPC, a manufacturer of PLLs and oscillating ICs

• Fujitsu monochrome plasma displays (I need the power supply for the company's FPF8050HFUG 640×400-dot display)

• A source for an RF-shielding material made of an aluminized cardboard

• A college engineering textbook published in the 1950s or '60s on designing IF transformers and metal-frame tuning capacitors.

If you have any information, please contact me at 1-309-924-1811, fax 1-309-924-1228.

--Scott Simpson, Stronghurst, IL

Ask EDN solves nagging design problems and provides the answers to difficult questions. You can address your letters to Ask EDN, 275 Washington St, Newton, MA 02158, fax 1-617-558-4470, bmorrison@edn.cahners.com.

Get a leg up with ARM-based
embedded-array designs

The ARM 32-bit RISC µP shows up in interesting places. GEC Plessey is now offering the ARM7TDMI as a core for use in the company's embedded arrays. The arrays let you place the µP and other predefined blocks, such as RAM and ROM, onto a gate array and then let you customize the logic around the blocks for an application.

You can define your core functions and chip pinout before layout and fine-tune your design, and GEC Plessey processes your chip with the ARM core to the point at which it is ready for metal. After you complete and sign off the design, only wafer metallization remains in the wafer process, saving design-turnaround time.

Along with the physical embedded-array technology and an ARM core, GEC Plessey also has developed VHDL- and Verilog-based ASIC design flows that work with standard EDA tools from Cadence (San Jose, CA), Mentor (Wilsonville, OR), and Synopsys (Mountain View, CA). You also get Synopsys Design Compiler timing models and scan-test patterns. With the ARM, GEC Plessey provides a C compiler, an assembler, a linker, and a Windows-based debugger for application-software development.

The ARM-based embedded arrays are available in 0.6- and 0.35-µm technologies. You have a choice of standard base-array sizes, or GEC Plessey can optimize a base for specialized I/O and gate-count requirements. Typical NRE charges for ARM-based arrays are $95,000 to $150,000.

--by Jim Lipman

GEC Plessey, San Jose, CA. 1-408-451-4700, fax 1-408-451-4710, www.gpsemi.com.

Maxfield strikes again

Popular EDN contributing editor Clive "Max" Maxfield, along with co-author Alvin Brown, has just released Bebop Bytes Back (An Unconventional Guide to Computers) (ISBN 0-9651934-0-3). This book is a sequel to Bebop to the Boolean Boogie (An Unconventional Guide to Electronics). Unlike other technical journals that you purchased with good intentions but that are now collecting dust, you'll probably find Bytes Back to be one of the more frequently referenced books in your collection. Nine labs, along with summary questions at the conclusion of each chapter and answers at the back of the 870-pg book reinforce concepts explained in Maxfield's often-humorous prose.

Bytes Back includes a CD-ROM with multimedia clips and a virtual computer, requiring Windows 95, with input and output devices and a cross assembler for programming. Even if you develop computer hardware and software every day, you'll enjoy Bytes Back's irreverent style and historical perspectives. It's a good refresher if you've been away from computer architecture for a while and is ideal for students. Bebop Bytes Back costs $49.95. You can find more information at http://ro.com/~bebopbb.

--by Brian Dipert

Doone Publications, Madison, AL. 1-205-837-0580, fax 1-205-837-0580, www.doone.com.

Calendar

Sept 21 to 26

International Switching Symposium '97: World Telecommunications Conference, Toronto, addresses technological developments and the future of the global telecomm industry. The event features scientific seminars and more than 140 technical papers covering wireless, wire-line, computer, Internet, cable, and end-user applications. The Pinnacle Group, Toronto, ON, Canada. 1-416-588-3522.

Sept 23 to 25

Assembly Technology Expo, Rosemont, IL, offers 525 national and international vendors in more than 1500 booths displaying automatic-assembly systems, power and hand tools, robotics, bar-coding devices, fasteners, electronics, and assembly hardware. The show presents an operating pc-board-assembly line, which features surface-mount and through-hole technologies. Assembly Technology Expo, Carol Stream, IL. 1-630-260-9700.

Sept 26 to 29

Audio Engineering Society Convention, New York, presents more than 140 papers and 16 workshops on audio techniques and technologies. Workshop topics include audio implications of digital video disk, remote-location recording, multichannel sound for film and video, forensic audio, and more. The convention offers a 3-hour tutorial on perpetual coding of audio signals and a 5-hour session on networks and interactive audio. Audio Engineering Society, New York, NY. 1-212-661-8528.

Oct 5 to 9

IPCWorks '97, Washington, hosted by the Institute for Interconnecting and Packaging Electronic Circuits (IPC), features tutorials on making vias and microvias, fabricating advanced printed-wiring boards using buildup technologies, intelligent-bare-board test, and troubleshooting printed-wiring-board manufacturing. IPC, Northbrook, IL. 1-847-509-9700, ext 308.

Oct 6 to 8

Matlab Conference, San Jose, CA, includes technical sessions, hands-on courses, user-contributed presentations, and a central lab in which attendees can use Matlab. Attendees can explore the new features of Matlab 5 and Simulink 2, see how users are applying new products, learn how to integrate third-party tools with The Mathworks' products, and learn how to use Matlab 5 and Simulink 2 for teaching and research. The Mathworks Inc, Natick, MA. 1-508-647-7777.

Oct 7 to 9

Nepcon Texas, Dallas, addresses how chip-scale-packaging technology can influence the design, performance, reliability, and cost of a package and product. The conference offers professional-advancement courses, workshops, and technical sessions. On-site registration costs $45. Reed Exhibition Companies, Norwalk, CT. 1-203-840-5856.

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