Microwave Engineering Europe - March 2009 - (Page 6) 6 NEWS IN BRIEF SiRF targets emerging automotive applications SiRF has partnered with M/A-COM to create a networked GPS module that provides location information to the latest vehicle-based communications and entertainment systems. The M/A-COM GPS module integrates a highly accurate SiRF GPS receiver running the SiRFDRive2 GPS dead reckoning software, a specialized GPS antenna, a microprocessor controller and memory, as well as a CAN bus transceiver and connector and associated software to create a “location server” on the vehicle network that location-enables the entire vehicle. The SiRFDRive2 software processes individual wheel tick counts, vehicle speed and other critical sensor data, and combines it with GPS satellite data to calculate highly accurate position, heading and time information available in all environments. www.mwee.com/213000653 OMAP 4 applications platform looks to the future of mobile computing Helping smartphone and mobile internet device manufacturers shape the future of the mobile market with innovative devices, the OMAP™ 4 mobile applications platform from Texas Instruments (TI) delivers leading multimedia-rich user experiences such as 1080p video record and playback, 20 megapixel imaging and approximately a week of audio play time. Launched at Mobile World Congress 2009, the platform provides significant improvements in performance and play time compared to today’s most popular smartphones, with 10x faster web page loading times, over 7x more computing performance, 6x higher video resolution, 10x better graphics and 6x longer audio play time. At the heart of the OMAP 4 platform is a powerful system-on-chip that balances power efficiency and high performance. The OMAP 4 processor balances processing across four main engines: — a programmable multimedia engine based on the company’s C64x DSP and power-efficient, multi-format hardware accelerators; — general-purpose processing based on the dualcore ARM® Cortex™-A9 MPCore™ supporting symmetric multiprocessing (SMP) and capable of speeds of more than 1 GHz per core; — a high-performance programmable graphics engine; — and an Image Signal Processor (ISP) for unparalleled video and imaging performance. The OMAP 4 platform also includes a comprehensive software suite, power management technology and other supporting components, providing the foundation necessary to create devices with mobile computing performance at low power. The OMAP 4 platform’s built in 45-nm process technology enables mobile device manufacturers to address the expected applications of tomorrow’s handsets, while also providing headroom and programmability to support applications that have yet to be imagined. The platform will support popular leading mobile operating systems and is validated for real-world use cases. The OMAP 4 platform and development tools are expected to sample in the second half of 2009, with production expected by the second half of 2010. The first members of the family are the OMAP4430 and OMAP4440, with key attributes such as dedicated ISP; full 1080p multi-standard HD record and playback; digital SLR-like performance with 20 megapixel imaging; and 3D user interfaces supporting life-like graphics, intuitive touch screens, large local displays beyond WSXGA and HDMI compatible external displays. Industry-leading power management technology delivers rich multimedia performance while maximizing battery life. www.mwee.com/214303095 ASOCS/Renesas deliver GSM/GPRS/EDGE development system ASOCS and Renesas Technology Europe have announced a GSM/GPRS/EDGE communication development system (CDS) that comprises an ASOCS MP100 MultiComms processor and a Renesas Technology DRACO3 RF subsystem. The development system allows handset designers to rapidly prototype combined cellular and Internet products. According to ACSOS, the proven, stable RF sub-system from Renesas enables quick time to market with MP100 MultiComms processor-based handsets and handhelds. The ASOCS MP100 MultiComms processor offers high-performance software reconfigurable modems, low latency air-interface switching, and minimal power consumption — enabling user-transparent access to the Internet. Using this processor, handset and device developers can now run cellular and Wi-Fi concurrently. www.mwee.com/213403483 Fraunhofer shows platform-independent handset application development system The Fraunhofer entity for communication technology systems (Munich) has developed a software platform that allows software developers to build mobile handset applications independently of the underlying hardware. In order to decouple the application software from the hardware, the system, a result of the research project ‘Elephant’ requires an interpreter software running at the target system. The development environment supports multimedia content such as images and sounds and video. According to Fraunhofer, it shields the programmers from the complexity of the target hardware by offering templates as well as drag-and-drop methods to generate the application program ● flow. In addition, Elephant supports interactive cooperation by embracing web 2.0 technologies, Fraunhofer said. According to a Fraunhofer spokesperson, the version demonstrated at the recent Mobile World Congress 2009 runs under the Windows Mobile operating system. Versions for Symbian or Linux are planned as well, the spokesperson said. “The operating system environment will depend on the preferences of our partners, and we won’t market Elephant by ourselves but we are here to search for an industrial partner”, the spokesperson added. www.mwee.com/214502646 Microwave Engineering Europe ● March 2009 www.mwee.com http://www.mwee.com/213000653 http://www.mwee.com/214303095 http://www.mwee.com/214502646 http://www.mwee.com/213403483 http://www.mwee.com
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