Two high-speed Ethernet ports and two 16550 serial ports do wonders with the MIPS-based Vr7700 core in NEC's new Vr7701 system-on-a-chip (SoC). Running at 400 MHz, the Vr7701 has plenty of horsepower for high-performance embedded network applications such as routers and network RAID devices.
The chip incorporates a level 2 cache with independent I/O and CPU access with a sustained 1087-Mbyte/s bandwidth. Running at 200 MHz, the cache contains 256 Mbytes of ECC memory. A built-in 133-MHz SDRAM controller supports 64-bit double-data-rate (DDR) SDRAM.
Additional peripherals can be accessed via the 64-bit, 133-MHz PCI-X interface. A multiplexed 33-MHz, 32-bit local bus interface also is available. The 64-bit superscaler processor implements the MIPS IV instruction set and the new MIPS 64 instructions. Debugging is available via JTAG and N-wire interfaces.
The chip is based on 0.13-µm, 1.5-V technology. Its core is compatible with the NEC Vr5500, which supports Wind River VxWorks, MontaVista Linux, and Microsoft Windows CE. Available in June, the Vr7701 comes in a 500-pin advanced ball-grid array (ABGA) package. It costs under $100 in quantities.
NEC, www.nec.com; (800) 338-9549.
