How low can 32 bits go?
By Robert Cravotta -- EDN, November 10, 2005
With the new LPC2101, LPC2102, and LPC2103 microcontrollers, Philips Electronics continues to push down the lower limit for the price of a 32-bit unit. These ARM-7 TDMI-S-based devices sell for as little as $1.47 (10,000). Philips accomplished this lower price in part by offering on-chip memories as small as 2 kbytes of SRAM and 8 kbytes of flash. The other two microcontrollers offer as much as 8 kbytes of SRAM and 32 kbytes of flash. These devices will be available this month.
These devices improve on Philips last year’s less-than-$3 32-bit offerings by increasing the clock rate from 60 to 70 MHz and maintaining no-wait-state operation from flash and SRAM. These devices introduce and implement fast general-purpose I/O through the local bus that provides a fourfold performance increase in the ARM-7’s bit-banging, so that it can support a 17.5-MHz toggle rate. All three devices include an eight-channel, 10-bit ADC that samples at 400k samples/sec.
These devices support expanded power management to enable designers to reduce power consumption to as low as 5 μA. Power consumption in power-down mode with the real-time clock running is less than 10 μA. The devices have as many as 32 5V-tolerant general-purpose I/O pins. Evaluation kits are available with prices starting at $99. The IAR Systems (www.iar.com) Kickstart kits include a free 32-kbyte compiler, and Keil Software (www.keil.com) evaluation kits include a free 16-kbyte compiler.
Philips Electronics, www.semiconductors.philips.com.
