Bill is a staff editor for Electronic Design focusing on embedded,
software, and systems. He is also the editor for the Embedded in Electronic Design department and the weekly hands-on column, EiED Online. He prefers press releases via email and images should be at least 300dpi. Links to product photos is prefered. Email address: bwong@penton.com Web site: http://www.elecdesign.com/Departments/DepartmentID/67/67.html
2084 results found for William Wong, displaying items 1 - 20
June 25, 2009
[Lab Bench] Prevarication, Damn Lies, And Benchmarks
Bill Wong discusses the reliability of the new CoreMark benchmark with Markus Levy, president of the Embedded Microprocessor Benchmark Consortium (EEMBC).
June 25, 2009
[Embedded in Electronic Design] COM Module Adds Atom
Kontron’s microETXexpress-DC Computer-on-Module features a 1.6-GHz N270 Intel Atom processor with the 945GSE and ICH7M chipsets. The 3D graphics accelerator handles dual independent displays with support for SVDO, LVDS, VGA, and TV-out.
June 25, 2009
[Embedded in Electronic Design] Atom Comes In A Tiny ECX Package
The Atom-based ML936-B16 fits into the 105- by 146-mm Embedded Compact Extended (ECX) form factor sponsored by Intel. This is a nice match with 3.5-in. form factors. The single-board computer includes a low-power, 1.6-GHz Z530P Intel Atom processor and a US15WP System Controller Hub (SCH).
June 25, 2009
[Embedded in Electronic Design] Smallest MCU Hits 2- By 2-mm Form Factor
Silicon Laboratories continues to push down the size of 8-bit microcontrollers. Its C8051T606 mixed-signal microcontroller comes in a 2- by 2-mm, 10-pin mini small-outline package (MSOP). It is also available in 3- by 3-mm, 14-pin small-outline IC (SOIC) and 10-pin quad flat no-lead (QFN) packages.
June 25, 2009
[Embedded in Electronic Design] AdvancedTCA Board Supports Eight Cores
Diversified Technology’s ATC6239 Dual Quad-Core board is powered by 2.4-GHz AMD “Shanghia” Opteron processors with 6 Mbytes of L3 cache. The PICMG 3.1-compatible board supports up to 32 Gbytes of DRAM plus dual-port 10-Gbit Ethernet.
June 25, 2009[Technology Report] Match Multicore With Multiprogramming
Across the embedded landscape, the design credo has become “more cores.” However, challenges remain when it comes to the software side. Some hardware architectures can deliver dozens of cores, while others hit thousands of cores. Unfortunately, applications don’t always port easily across different architectures. For the low end of the embedded space, single-core solutions will remain. It’s still possible to move up the power and performance curve by moving to...
June 25, 2009[Lab Bench] My E-mail Ate My Homework
I’m becoming more forgetful these days— or rather my e-mail is (Fig. 1). Like many of you, I work for a company that limits the lifetime of e-mail. At first, this seems reasonable. It saves space, even though hard-disk prices per terabyte are falling faster than a fully populated NAS box. It’s also a great way to eliminate evidence. This policy has some unintended consequences, though, for...
June 25, 2009[Leapfrog: First Look] Nonvolatile Storage Doesn't Require Transistors
The CMOx nonvolatile memory technology from Unity Semiconductor targets storage-class memory applications. CMOx is based on new materials in the semiconductor process called conductive metal oxides that use the movement of ionic charge carriers to store information. With 64-Gbit chip capacity on the horizon, it looks to be a challenger to NAND flash. The technology employs a multi-layer, multi-level cell (MLC) approach that gives...
June 18, 2009[Technology Report] Laptops, Netbooks, And E-books, Oh My!
You don’t need to wave a magic wand to capitalize on the hordes of mobile devices that are on the market these days. They’ve become bright spots in a wobbly consumer electronics industry as buyers look for new bargains. In many instances, the cutting edge, such as the iPhone and Kindle, still carries a premium price. But the potential of lower-cost alternatives as well as the functionality provided by these new platforms is driving interest. ...
June 18, 2009[Technology Report] Putting Robots In Harm's Way
Aremote-controlled landing craft approaches a beach and deploys its robotic cohorts, including a helicopter. The helicopter flies inland and deposits a set of tracked robots that split up to reconnoiter. They use laser designators to highlight targets for incoming robot fighter planes that will launch missiles as part of a coordinated attack. This futuristic scenario is years away, not decades. Odds are good that if you step on a battlefield, a...
June 11, 2009[Leapfrog: First Look] Storage Technology Begins To Crystallize
It’s not in stores yet, but Freescale Semiconductor hopes its silicon crystal approach to flash memory will address the scaling issues that can be found with current approaches. The continuing demand for nonvolatile storage will likely mean this technology will be employed sooner than later. The floating-gate approach to NOR flash implementations is vulnerable to extrinsic reliability fallout as scaling increases. Likewise, the processing ...
June 11, 2009[Lab Bench] Accelerometers Shake Up The Old Ways To Play
Is it time to think outside the box or just give it a shake? Movement- or gesture-oriented input isn’t new. Try shaking a cell phone like Apple’s iPhone. Matched with the right application, like a game, juggling the phone may produce the effect you want. Then again, it may not. These little tricks are brought to you by accelerometers. Microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) technology has made these devices small and inexpensive. They’re used to shut down...
June 11, 2009[Embedded in Electronic Design] Are You Using More Than One Software Analysis Tool?
Actually, a better question for many embedded developers is whether they’re using even one code analysis tool. In many cases, the number of static or dynamic analysis tools used by a programmer is zero. At the same time, the goal that seems to be on top of everyone’s list is getting bug-free software done on time. Unfortunately, this can be a challenge when you aren’t using these tools. Most developers know that finding and fixing bugs early is less...
June 11, 2009[Embedded in Electronic Design] The Latest Static And Dynamic Analysis Tools
Designers can take advantage of a host of new static and dynamic code analysis tools from different vendors. Coverity has a range of static and dynamic analysis tools, but its Coverity Build Analysis addresses an aspect that is key to the development process but often overlooked—the build process. It helps Coverity stand out from the pack in addition to helping prevent bugs in the build process by identifying issues such as using the wrong object...
June 11, 2009[Embedded in Electronic Design] Chip Links PCI Express And USB
The OXPCIe200 PCI Express (PCIe) bridge links a 1x PCI Express host to a pair of USB host interfaces or one USB host interface and an SPI/SRAM interface (see the figure). The bridge also provides access to a serial port and eight generalpurpose I/Os (GPIOs). The bridge’s dual-USB mode provides one high-speed and one full-speed USB 2.0 host interface. The high-speed interface has a...
June 11, 2009[Embedded in Electronic Design] Common-Law Accelerator Offloads DSP
Adding a Control Law Accelerator (CLA) to Texas Instruments’ line of C28x DSPs can boost performance in applications such as motor control, LED lighting, and digital power by a factor of five. This allows the TMS- 320F2803x chip to handle more demanding applications or deliver high performance with lower power requirements. The F2803x family’s C28x DSP core delivers 60 MIPS. Compared to the F2802x, the newer siblings provide peripheral ...
June 11, 2009[Embedded in Electronic Design] NAND Delivers Capacity And NOR Capabilities
Samsung’s Flex One NAND has moved to 40 nm. It combines multi-level cell (MLC) and single-level cell (SLC) flash with an SRAM front end providing NOR functionality, including the ability to run applications directly. The Flex One uses a 2-kbyte SRAM cache to implement SLC flash. Designers can configure the flash memory split into SLC (code and data) and MLC (data) partitions. MLC storage density is twice the 1-bit/cell total for the SLC...
May 26, 2009
[Web Exclusive] Low Power Microcontroller-based Design Techniques
Technology Editor Bill Wong talks to Brant Ivey, Application Engineer at Microchip, about low power microcontroller system design. Low power design tends to be application specific so there is a lot of ground to cover. Brant touches on a range of power related issues and discusses ways to reduce power consumption.
Bill is a staff editor for Electronic Design focusing on embedded,
software, and systems. He is also the editor for the Embedded in Electronic Design department and the weekly hands-on column, EiED Online. He prefers press releases via email and images should be at least 300dpi. Links to product photos is prefered.
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