Design Article
Accelerate your MCU-based design process
Kim Rowe, RoweBots Research
10/16/2009 1:06 PM EDT
Microcontroller architectures are evolving into full-fledged systems-on-chip (SoCs). While this puts many features at a designer's disposal, it also ups the ante with respect to complexity, particularly when it comes to software.
Yes, vendors are working hard to relieve the pressure on their customers and are providing software modules with their chips--including demos to ensure those chips meet the design specifications. However, those modules have some downsides, including quality control, testing, standardization and licensing limitations.
As a result, according to Kim Rowe, chief technology officer at RoweBots Research Inc., a specialist in embedded signal processing, "MCU users are getting dragged into the software implementation, at the same time they may not fully understand how to use software components to their advantage to reduce costs, save time and reduce risk."
"The intent [with this feature] is to educate them about the total costs over time so that they can make better decisions for their companies."
Toward the end, the feature shows why Rowe believes RoweBots' DSPnano and Unison, "are clearly the best choices for an ultra tiny embedded Linux for MCUs and they will minimize cost, minimize risk and maximize profits."
What do you think? Let me know at pmannion@techinsights.com. Alternatively, add your comments below.
Enjoy!
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Ray Keefe
10/16/2009 10:53 PM EDT
Hi Kim,
if you look at all the features and identify up front the split between hardware and software implementations then that works really for optimising the project. Assuming of course that the requirements/features don't change.
We do a lot of projects where we can significantly reduce the overall cost by doing this allocation up front.
The total cost of course spans more than just component cost and development cost. There are also manufacturing costs, reworks costs, return costs and tooling costs to consider. And it is the best overall position across all these costs that matters. This is the main thrust of strategies for low cost electronics manufacture.
If you just optimise for one aspect then you rarely get the overall result you want.
The trend is clearly to do more in software to get component costs down but it doesn't always work out like that.
Ray Keefe
http://www.successful.com.au
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