News & Analysis
Energy Micro launches ARM-based Gecko microcontrollers
Peter Clarke
10/21/2009 12:19 PM EDT
The parts are based on a ARM Cortex-M3 licensee and Energy Micro has said that the company will provide 22 different parts over the next few months with most sampling in the fourth quarter and becoming available in volume in the first quarter of 2010.
The microcontrollers are implemented in the 180-nm ultra low leakage process from TSMC and have been shown to consume less than 180-microamps per megahertz while executing code from flash memory, the company said. Standby current consumption is 900-nA while running real time clock, power-on reset, brown-out detector and full RAM and CPU retention and less than 20-nA in the microccontroller's deepest sleep mode.
"We are very proud that we have delivered on our mission to provide the world with the most energy friendly microcontrollers," said Geir Forre, founder and CEO, of Energy Micro, in a statement "By introducing innovative new energy saving features, such as our peripheral reflex system and energy management unit, the potential saving in battery life that can be achieved is immense"
The EFM32G microcontroller products come in a variety of packages including QFN32, QFN64, QFP100 and BGA112. The EFM32G operates from a single supply rail of between 1.8 and 3.8V. The operating temperature range is "40degC to +85degC. The microcontrollers provide up to 128-kbytes of flash memory and up to 16-kbytes of RAM.
Pricing for the initial 32-pin devices starts at $1.55 in 100k quantities.
Related links and articles:
Energy Micro seeks engineers to develop microcontrollers
ARM preps tiny core for low-power microcontrollers
Arctic startup secures $4.5 million funding
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embedded_enthusiast
10/23/2009 5:45 PM EDT
Great, finally. Been waiting for another ARM CM3 player and cheking their site every once in a while.
40degC to +85degC
This sure means (minus) -40degC !?
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zx11
10/25/2009 10:20 AM EDT
In real-life you might be interested in making Analog-toDigital Conversion of some measured signal, for example. On the company's webpage ( http://www.energymicro.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=109&Itemid=261 ) it is said that a 12-bit A/D conversion could drain 200 uA. Power consumption = I*V.
How useful is a statement like "The microcontrollers are implemented in the 180-nm ultra low leakage process from TSMC and have been shown to consume less than 180-microamps per megahertz while executing code from flash memory, "
This is comparable to the current drawn from one of the peripherals (?).
If Energy Micro can prove to be better than the competitors for important real life applications this would be impressive. But, they have to convince..
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