Luminary Micro Stellaris LM3S1000, LM3S8000, and LM3S6000: Microcontrollers provide real-time internetworking and IEEE 1588 support

The Stellaris microcontroller family includes 20 high-pin-count, real-time LM3S1000 microcontrollers; 11 LM3S8000 Ethernet+CAN (controller-area-network) series; and three LM3S6000 devices. The LM3S1000 series features expanded general-purpose I/O, larger on-chip memory, and low-power optimization for battery-backed applications. The LM3S8000 combines Ethernet MAC (media-access-control) and physical layers with as many as three on-chip CAN-interface chips. Ethernet features include integrated 10/100-Mbps, full- and half-duplex operation; automatic MDI/MDI-X crossover correction; a programmable MAC address; promiscuous-mode support; and single-cycle, 2-kbyte transmitting and 2-kbyte receiving buffers. The device also includes Bosch-licensed CAN controllers featuring 1-Mbps rates, 32 message objects per controller, and automatic transmission disable for TTCAN (time-triggered communication on CAN). The LM3S6000 series and six of the LM3S8000 series features hardware assist for IEEE 1588 PTP (precise-time-protocol) support. A battery-backed hibernation module in 32 of the microcontrollers includes a real-time clock; 256 bytes of nonvolatile, battery-backed memory; and the ability to wake on a real-time clock match, external-pin interrupt, or low-battery event. Evaluation-tool-suite choices for the kits include ARM RealView MDK (microcontroller-development kit), IAR Embedded Workbench Kickstart Edition, and CodeSourcery Sourcery G++ GNU tools. Communications stacks available for the LM3S8962 Ethernet+CAN evaluation kit include Express Logic NetX TCP/IP; InterNiche TCP/IP Niche Stack; NicheLite; and add-on modules, including HTTP, SNMP (simple-network-management protocol), and security protocols; CMX-MicroNet and CMX-CANopen; FreeRTOS.org-based open-source uIP stack; Micrium µC/TCP-ip, µC/Modbus, and µC/CAN; and RTA Automation EtherNET/IP and DeviceNet. The Stellaris LM3S1968 evaluation kit costs $59; the Stellaris LM3S8962 Ethernet+CAN evaluation kit costs $89.

Luminary Micro, www.luminarymicro.com