Embedded Systems Design Europe - November 2007 - (Page 39) new products Microchip adopts MIPS for MCUs Microchip’s PIC32 family of 32-bit microcontrollers (MCUs), increase performance and add memory while maintaining pin, peripheral and development compatibility with the company’s 16-bit MCU/DSC families. The PIC32 family is based on the industry-standard MIPS32 architecture – see page 6. The PIC32’s MIPS32 M4K core can achieve 1.5 DMIPS/ MHz operation through use of an efficient instruction-set architecture, 5-stage pipeline, hardware multiply/accumulate unit and up to 8 sets of 32 core registers. In addition, to reduce memory requirements, the PIC32 supports the MIPS16e 16 bit ISA – enabling code-size reductions of up to 40 percent. The PIC32 family is fully supported by Microchip’s free MPLAB integrated development environment (IDE) which now offers unprecedented compatibility by supporting Microchip’s complete portfolio of 8-, 16- and 32bit devices. Launching with seven general-purpose devices, the PIC32 family operates at up to 72 MHz and provides sample code- and data-space with up to 512 kbyte flash and 32 kbyte RAM. The PIC32 family also includes a integrated peripherals including a variety of communication peripherals and a 16-bit parallel master port supporting additional memory and displays. All PIC32 products are supported by Microchip’s development tools, including the MPLAB IDE, the new MPLAB C32 C compiler, the MPLAB REAL ICE emulation system, the MPLAB ICD 2 in-circuit debugger and the Explorer 16 development board. The MPLAB development tool supports the PIC32 32-bit microcontroller family. The PIC32 tool support is available from the free MPLAB IDE version 8.0, the MPLAB C32 C compiler (including a free evaluation version), the MPLAB REAL ICE emulation system and the MPLAB ICD 2 in-circuit debugger. The MPLAB C32 C compiler is The MPLAB REAL ICE emulation system supports the PIC32 family with full-speed real-time emulation, a stopwatch and logic I/O connections. Adding the MPLAB REAL ICE Trace kit enables the MPLAB REAL ICE emulation system to capture trace data from the instruction trace port on the PIC32. The PIC32 is also launching with broad MIPS-based tool support from other suppliers. Complete tool chains are available from Ashling, Green Hills and HiTech—including C and C++ compilers, IDEs and debuggers. RTOS support is available from various vendors including CMX, Express Logic, FreeRTOS, Micrium, Segger and Pumpkin. In addition, graphics display tools providers include EasyGUI, Segger, RamTeX and Micrium. The PIC32 Starter Kit comes complete with everything that developers need to get started, including the USB-powered MCU board, MPLAB IDE and the MPLAB C32 C compiler, documentation, sample projects with tutorials, schematics, and 16-bit compatible peripheral libraries. Application expansion boards are also being made available, which plug into the expansion slot on the bottom of the MCU board. The first devices in the PIC32 family come in 64- or 100-pin TQFP packages. The family has been sampling into early adopter designs, and is now available for general sampling. Volume production for all seven initial devices is expected in Q2 2008. www.microchip.com/PIC32. 39 available now with a free Student Edition that supports 64 kbyte of compiled code, and a full edition that supports unlimited compiled code. The MPLAB C32 is fully integrated with the MPLAB IDE and select thirdparty IDEs. The compiler package includes an ANSI C compiler, assembler, linker and peripheral libraries for the PIC32 family. The peripheral libraries are API compatible with the MPLAB C30 C compiler that is used with Microchip’s 16-bit MCU and DSC families. www.embedded.com/europe | embedded systems design europe | NOVEMBER – DECEMBER 2007 039_ESDE.indd 39 9/11/07 11:15:40 http://www.microchip.com/PIC32 http://www.embedded.com/europe
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