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01 November 2007
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News & Analysis
The latest maneuvers in the chess match between Advanced Micro Devices Inc. and Intel Corp. find the rivals advancing toward similar architectures.
Suppliers of mobile TV technology waiting for the fledgling market to take wing have already entered a race for survival.
Unfazed by overcapacity and pricing pressures in the tumultuous market for NOR flash memory, Spansion Inc. has begun limited production in the industry's first 300mm NOR fab.
Intel Corp. said it is working with a handful of companies on a spec that could push the USB's theoretical throughput beyond 4Gbps, or 10 times its current rate.
Today's services controlled by physicians and hospitals will give way to a new model in which consumers directly access devices and services on the Internet or their emerging home and personal area networks.
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Pushing toward Hong Kong's vision to transform into a knowledge-based economy and become the region's R&D center, the HKSTP unveiled its Phase II complex in September.
With the migration to 45nm cores, optimized I/O planning and placement will become even more critical. These challenges beg the question: Who should take charge of a chip's I/O plan along with the considerations for the package and the rest of the system?
To minimize some of the issues at 45nm designs, a heightened effort is required to develop tools and methodology to meet process power/performance and area entitlement from node to node.
The demand for connectivity intellectual property (IP) for high-speed serial buses is increasing. High-speed serial buses require high-performance analog/mixed-signal circuits that can be designed using standard deep sub-micron CMOS technologies.
Much can be done to make prototypes faster to bring up and easier to change. The ultimate goal is to create an environment where designers can get to work quickly, debug rapidly and make changes without delay. In this new era, FPGA-based prototyping will have a key position along with other verification methodologies.
Perfect symmetry is—of course—unattainable. But designers can come close to that ideal to obtain the best differential-signaling results by following a few fundamental rules.
Playing with assembly code is really tremendous fun, but if you try to tell this to the young people of today, they won't believe you.
A change is likely to have occurred behind the scenes in display sizes below about 15-inches: the CCFL lighting system for the LCD is rapidly being replaced by LEDs.
Texas Instruments offers battery charger front-end ICs that increase protection when charging a cellphone or other portable electronic device.
Portable electronic devices today require additional power circuits to drive auxiliary RGB status lights and to backlight the keypad, making lighting a major power management challenge.
The sleepy clock-generator chip market shook itself awake as two rival vendors, Cypress Semiconductor and SpectraLinear rolled entries in a new class of programmable devices.
DSPs jazz up the music scene—take the case of Sparta's lead guitarist, Keeley Davis, who is harnessing a Freescale Semiconductor DSP in a guitar effects "POD" from Line 6 that instantly swaps preset tones.
ChipSensors Ltd, a startup with a pedigree in sensors and mixed-signal CMOS design, unveiled a technology that it claims will let the surface of an IC sense temperature, humidity, pathogens and certain gases.
Despite the fickleness of the investment community—a tendency to jump on the "bandwagon of the moment" investment in both nanotech and MEMS startups has remained relatively strong for the past three years, and almost evenly split between the two.
Technical Features
A whole-home entertainment network requires the rethinking of what we have traditionally found to be acceptable for "best effort" networks of the past. Streaming HD content around the home raises the bar substantially, requiring increased data throughputs coupled with higher levels of QoS. (PDF file)
Using devices such as a second-generation dual-media GbE PHY is the best way to achieve Ethernet media interface flexibility and still keep system BOM costs down. (PDF file)
Using the Open Core Protocol can reduce the time and cost of developing 3D graphics technology for the embedded space. (PDF file)
Using a customizable MCU with an MPCF allows designers to integrate their custom IP into a near off-the-shelf solution. It offers the cost, power consumption and performance benefits of a full-custom ASIC, with NREs and design cycle that are not much different from those of an off-the-shelf MCU + FPGA design. (PDF file)
With a wealth of USB options available, designers are hard-pressed to pick the right one for their applications. Know the basics of USB and all its flavors. (PDF file)
The variety and performance of graphics display controllers enable an innovative set of new infotainment applications in vehicles. GDCs are a critical component in navigation and video products, and will become even more important as car makers differentiate their models. (PDF file)
Take a peek at the inner workings of a board that can perform continuous conduction mode power factor correction efficiently and with a minimum number of peripheral components. (PDF file)
Great hopes are being pinned on multiprocessor and parallel architecture as the answers for the continuing development of electronics and computing. The picoArray from picoChip is an example of a product which makes possible the promise of these two technologies. (PDF file)
The growing demand for cheap consumer wireless applications calls for unprecedented levels of integration. Among all the challenges to address ESI impact on analog and RF victims, modeling noise generation and injection is particularly tricky. The issue is to collect the power supply and substrate currents in both time and frequency domains. (PDF file)
The implementation of a mixed-signal stimulus-response test application imposes high requirements on both software and hardware. These technology problems are fundamentally simplified with the modular hardware architecture and professional open software platform. (PDF file)
This article describes HDMI key tests that ensure validation, the challenges faced while testing complex HDMI signals and how oscilloscope-resident test software enables unprecedented efficiency improvements with reliable results and unprecedented automation to perform a wide range of tests. (PDF file)
Developers can significantly simplify handset testing by zeroing on the development of reusable test logic that can be used with automated testing platforms. An adaptive test case methodology boosts test case development and enables reuse of test IP across test cases, handset platforms and OS. (PDF file)
Opinion
We are witnessing an unprecedented growth in automotive electronics with the emergence of new applications in infotainment, safety, and chassis and engine control.
An obvious advantage of having USB as the universal connector in mobile apps is its cost-effectiveness. In the years to come, more and more consumer electronic products will indeed be powered by USB, making the promise of USB power come to life.
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