Don't expect the same old stuff at the 2007 Embedded Systems Conference, scheduled
for April 1-5 at the McEnery Convention Center in San Jose, Calif. This year's show
will be virtually bursting at the seams, with
many vendors setting up shop outside the
main exhibit hall. Vendors seem to be
cautiously optimistic, now that issues like the European Union's Restrictions on Hazardous Substances (RoHS) are being addressed and the latest
standards-based technologies like Serial ATA (SATA) and PCI Express are commonplace. In fact, this optimism has
triggered the return of numerous exhibitors and attracted a host of new vendors.
SOFTWARE
The latest crop of compilers, debuggers,
and graphical interfaces will be on display, along with
some new technologies like Wind River's Sensorpoint. This
runtime instrumentation is tightly coupled with the company's Eclipse-based Workbench development environment.
Developers can add a chunk of code that gets patched into a running system. This code can monitor an application or even
fix a bug. The major difference between Sensorpoint and debugging scripts is that Sensorpoint can incorporate any code into
the application, and the changes can be applied without running a debugger. The development environment facilitates the
migration of fixes back into the code tree.
Microsoft will have plenty of products and partners at its booth. Developers will want to look more closely at the company's lightweight .NET Micro Framework. It handles chores that would be overkill for Windows CE, Microsoft's embedded
operating system, to tackle. Also, it can fit on many single-chip microcontrollers.
WIRELESS
ZigBee and 802.15.4
remain hot topics. In fact, they have
their own show at ESC. The tech sessions at the ZigBee Developer's Conference complement the vendors at ESC.
Most ZigBee chip and software vendors
also will be at the show.
Attendees can check out products
like the EmberZNet Pro protocol stack
and development platforms from wireless sensor and control network manufacturer Ember (). EmberZNet
Pro embodies the latest ZigBee standard, including profile support, and
adds Ember's extensions. Its power-management and network monitoring
support is impressive. Also, it can be
especially invaluable in large ZigBee
networks.
The low end of the spectrum offers
up some interesting tidbits as well.
Microchip will return to the show with
its MRF24J40 transceiver. It supports
ZigBee as well as Microchip's MiWi,
which is based on 802.15.4 and suits
applications that don't require ZigBee's
complexity or licensing issues. Technologies like Wireless USB and Ultra-Wideband (UWB) will be on display, too. And
don't forget about the continual stream
of 802.11 products.
CHIPS, DIPs, AND FPGAs
Plenty
of surprises are in store at the chip level. Arm and Actel will show off the Cortex-M1. Based on Arm's 32-bit Cortex
architecture, the Cortex-M1 is specially
designed for FPGA deployment. Essentially, it provides a soft-core, de facto
standards-based platform.
Licensing becomes simpler because
Actel M1 FPGA developers can use it
without paying licensing fees or royalties,
which are part of the chip cost. The Cortex-M1, which features a three-stage
pipeline, runs the ARMv6-M instruction
set. It supports tightly coupled memories
(TCMs) for instruction and data. The
architecture supports the AHB bus and
CoreConsole.
Products based on tried-and-true
architectures like Texas Instruments'
MSP430 will be on display, along with a
passel of development kits and platforms. For instance, there's the MSP430
Experimenters Board, which even has a
spot to add a Chipcon module for 802.15.4 or ZigBee support ().
FlexRay and controller-area networks (CANs) continue to make
inroads in the automotive space.
Freescale's 40-MHz S08DZ60 CAN-based microcontroller incorporates
up to 60 kbytes of flash; 4 kbytes of RAM; 24-channel, 16-bit
analog-to-digital converters (ADCs); comparators; EEPROM; a real-time clock; and a local-interconnect-network
(LIN) master controller. Its multiple
clock generator reduces power consumption and can be used in most
instances without a voltage regulator.
Pricing starts under $3.
On the high-performance side, PCI
Express continues to gain ground. PLX
will exhibit its eight-port, eight-lane
ExpressLane PEX 8509 and smaller
five-port, five-lane PEX 8505 PCI
Express switch chips, which use PLX's
cut-thru design for lower latency. They
also have peer-to-peer and hot-plug
support while drawing less than 1.5 W
in a 15- by 15-mm package. Pricing
starts at $8.
Motion-sensing demonstrations will
include microelectromechanical-systems (MEMS) technologies like STMicroelectronics' tiny (5- by 3- by 0.9-mm plastic package) three-axis accelerometers (). These LIS302 MEMS
motion sensors will find uses in applications like gaming and hard-disk protection. Pricing starts at $2.95.