Bill Wong discusses the reliability of the new CoreMark benchmark with Markus Levy, president of the Embedded Microprocessor Benchmark Consortium (EEMBC).

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.

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).

The F50x family of rugged CompactPCI single-board computers and conduction-cooled racks is designed for for –40°C to 85°C environments.

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.

As many designers familiar with military and aerospace applications know, VME has been the predominant form factor for more than 25 years. Because of its adaptability, ease of maintenance, and ruggedness, among other benefits, VME positioned itself extremely well against competing architectures years ago. Even today, in the face of upcoming VPX/VXS products, VME will have a significant role to play in the future of military and aerospace applications. ...

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...

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...

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...

In the classic board game Battleship, an adversary arranges a fleet of tiny, plastic combat vessels on a grid that’s hidden from view. After an analogous fleet is set up on a separate grid, the objective is to guess the locations of the opponent’s boats. Likewise, the opponent’s goal is to divine the whereabouts of your miniature ships. The game proceeds with ...

With my new role as Group Editorial Director, I’m going to miss doing my column in each issue of Electronic Design. So here I am joining the “blogosphere.”

From its introduction in 1995, the Universal Serial Bus (USB) quickly gained widespread acceptance for connecting peripherals to personal computers. More recently, its ease of use, expandability, high bandwidth, and low cost have suited it quite well for data transfer in embedded consumer electronic and mobile devices. Thus, product developers are increasingly being asked to design and implement a wide range of USB I/O devices. This idea describes a technique for...

I use this display circuit to expose students to the concepts and characteristics of scanning displays. Basically, a message is delivered to the CPU (a Microchip PIC16F76) over an RS-232 interface. The message is displayed on a vertical array of eight LEDs, which are spun by a dc motor. As they spin and take on new positions, the LEDs are updated with new lines of bit patterns, producing the display. In this way, the software allows the eight LEDs to emulate an 8-by-80...

At one time, reference designs were simply helpful guides to the finer details of designing a part into a board. Those days are long gone. The complexity of today’s devices, in addition to the fast pace of many markets, has forced some reference designs to evolve beyond educational tools into manufacturing documentation for fully defined end products (Fig. 1). This dual role leaves...

DIGITALLY CONTROLLED POTENTIOMETERS (DCPS) find uses in a wide variety of systems for setting bias currents, variable reference voltages, and calibration settings. In industrial control and automation applications, high accuracy is a must. DCPs with 1024 taps are available, but for a few dollars instead of tens of cents. A dual, 32-tap, 50-k DCP is available for 40 cents. Can we use both of the DCPs in the package and reach similar performance to the 1024...

HERE’S A C/C++ PROGRAM that converts decimal numbers ranging from 0 to 99,999 to binary and binary coded decimal (BCD) formats. Using a simple algorithm in conjunction with pointer arithmetic and bitwise shifting increases the conversion speed without introducing excessive memory overhead and programming complexity. When decimal numbers are within the range of 0 to 9, their binary and BCD representations are identical, requiring only four bits...