Embedded Processor Watch

Editor: Jim Turley
Sr. Editor: Tom Halfhill

In This Issue:

• StrongARM Team Transmutes Into Alchemy
• NETsilicon Lowers Net+ARM Price
• Industry Resources: Two Special Seminars at the Forum
• Industry Resources: Just Hired a New Marketing Manager?
• New Embedded IC Announcements

Rich Witek and Grep Hoeppner, the former Digital wizards largelyresponsible for the design of StrongARM, have formed AlchemyMicroprocessor Design Group. Alchemy will be spun off from Cadence, thedesign-tools firm that scooped up Witek, Hoeppner, and other Digitalrefugees after Intel's acquisition of the company in 1998. Phil Pompa,late of Motorola, is the group's VP of marketing.

As its first official move, Alchemy has signed a MIPS license agreement.The newly minted MIPS licensee's stated goal is to design and sell low-power (under 500 mW), high-integration processors for digital consumersystems. Specific targets for Alchemy's wizardry are cellular telephonesand Windows CE-based systems in the portable, palm-sized, and AutoPCform factors.

Alchemy will be a fabless chip company, independent of Cadence,designing its own parts and selling them under its own name. BecauseAlchemy is a MIPS licensee, the company does not have to use a licensedfoundry for its chips. The first integrated Alchemy devices are expected"in 18 months" according to the company.

If Alchemy's dark arts can transmute the MIPS architecture into ultralow power microprocessors as it did with ARM, vendors of standard-issueCPUs may have much to be concerned about. Three years after its debut,the SA-110 still leads the industry in performance per watt. Witek andcrew have a proven capacity for ignoring convention, turning theirskills to circuit-design tricks and tweaks that extract the mostperformance (or the least energy) from an architecture. The "StrongMIPS"chips will certainly compete head-to-head with the group's previousprogeny, StrongARM, which is now in the capable hands of Intel's formeri960 design group. By late 2000, the world may have at least two verycompetitive processor families for high-end portable systems.

NETsilicon Lowers Net+ARM Price

NETsilicon has added a fourth speed grade to its integrated Net+ARMproduct family (see Embedded Processor Watch #20). The all-in-oneprocessor plus Ethernet interface is now offered at a new low speed:5 MHz. The 5-MHz part lowers prices as well, to $12.50 in 10,000-unitquantities.

The unusually named Net+ARM 5 & 10T chip, like its predecessors,combines an ARM7 processor core, an Ethernet interface, and the low-level software required for ftp, http, browser, and mail interfaces.Hardware OEMs need to add little other than a physical-layer interfaceand memory to get a basic Internet interface up and running.

Previous generations of the Net+ARM product line are still available,running at 12, 15, and 40 MHz. The faster speed grades do not enhancenetwork performance, per se, but they do increase application headroomfor more-complex devices. NETsilicon's package approach should appeal tocompanies with the desire, but not the expertise, to add Internet or Webinterfaces to their equipment.

Industry Resources: Two Special Seminars at the Forum

In addition to the two main days of the conference, the EmbeddedProcessor Forum will offer two full-day seminars that provide in-depthfocus on embedded processors and DSP processors. Jim Turley and JeffBier will host the two full-day sessions.

On Monday, May 3rd, Jeff Bier of BDTI will spend a day evaluating,explaining, and debating the issues surrounding digital signalprocessing and the chips available for DSP work. Jeff's talk will rangefrom dedicated DSP chips from TI, Analog Devices, and others to newcores and designs from DSP Group, IBM, and Siemens. Focus topics will beselecting a DSP chip, evaluating performance claims, and preparing forwhat's to come.

On Thursday, May 6th, Jim Turley will hold forth on the state of 32-bitembedded processors. A look at both the technology and the marketdynamics, this in-depth view examines all the major RISC and CISCfamilies, the companies producing them, and their merits andshortcomings. Low-power, high-performance, and media-enabled processorswill be among the focus topics in this popular seminar.

Seminar attendance can be combined with the Forum, or seminar admissioncan be purchased alone. For more information, or to register, contactMDR at 800.527.0288 or visit http://www.MDRonline.com/epf.

Industry Resources: Just Hired a New Marketing Manager?

Then send him to ICE's one-day "Introduction to the IC Industry," notechnical background required. The seminar starts with an introductionto ICs, covers IC products and market trends, and finishes with wafermanufacturing fundamentals. The seminar "is presented in a manner thatis appropriate for individuals without a technical background,"according to the literature, including, presumably, short one-syllablewords and brightly colored pictures.

The seminar is held in several cities throughout the world and costs$595 per person (no child discount). For more information, or toregister, contact Integrated Circuit Engineering (Scottsdale, Ariz.) at602.515.9780 or visit http://www.ice-corp.com.

New Embedded IC Announcements

IMP5241 (IMP) Terminator IC for low-voltage differential (LVD) SCSIbuses provides auto-selectable differential or single-ended termination.Price: $3.56/1,000; Production: Now; Call IMP at 408.434.1467.

Ultra37032 (Cypress) CPLD is one of a family of Ultra37000 devices with5-ns propagation delay and in-system reprogrammability; with 32macrocells. Price: $1.25/10,000; Production: Now; Call Cypress at800.858.1810.

EPF10K30A (Altera) High-end PLD has 1,728 logic elements, 12,288 bits ofSRAM; suitable for 66-MHz PCI interface or 8-bit, 16-tap FIR filter.Price: $15/25,000; Production: Now; Call Altera at 408.544.7000.

87LPC764 (Philips) 80C51-based microcontroller has 4K OTP programmemory, 128 bytes SRAM, 20-MHz clock rate; in 20-pin SOIC or PDIP.Price: $1.10/10,000; Samples: Now; Production: 2Q99; Call Philips at408.991.2332.

S2066 (AMCC) CMOS quad-channel transceiver dissipates 575 milliwatts perchannel from one 3.3-V power supply; available in a 208-pin TBGApackage. Price: $68/100; Production: Now; Call AMCC at 619.535.4260.

S2068 (AMCC) Highly integrated dual-channel Gigabit Ethernet transceiverfor switches runs two channels at 1.25 Gbit/s full duplex. Price:$18.20/1,000; Production: Now; Call AMCC at 619.535.4260.

AD8014 (Analog Devices) High-speed amplifier with 400-MHz, 3-dBbandwidth, 4000-V/us slew rate and 24-ns settling time to 0.1%. Price:$1.19/1,000; Production: Now; Call ADI at 800.262.5643.