Product Brief
NXP to ship sub-dollar Cortex-M0 MCUs through distribution
Peter Clarke11/16/2009 6:15 AM EST
The LPC1100 will target battery applications, e-metering, consumer peripherals, remote sensors, and virtually all 16-bit applications. NXP has claimed that its LPC1100 is the lowest priced 32-bit microcontroller in the market and easier to use than existing 8- and 16-bit microcontrollers.
The recommended pricing in 10,000 piece quantities for 33-pin packaged devices is between $0.65 and $0.95 flash memory sizes of between 8-kbytes and 32-kbytes. In addition, 48-pin LPQFP and PLCC44 packages will be available for socketed applications.
The NXP LPC1100 family of microcontrollers features a 50-MHz Cortex-M0 processor with 32 vectored interrupts and 4 priority levels; multiple UARTS and one or two SPI serial interfaces; a 12-MHz internal RC oscillator, 10 to 50-MHz phase-locked loop; 8-channel 10-bit ADC and the devices operate from a single 1.8 to 3.6-volt power supply.
The NXP Cortex-M0 microcontroller offers over 45-DMIPs of performance compared to the sub-DMIP performance typical of 8-bit MCUs and 3 - 5 DMIPS for 16-bit MCUs. At 50-MHz current consumption is less than 10-mA NXP said.
The company also claimed that the LPC1100 range requires 40 to 50 less code for most common microcontroller tasks, than 8- or 16-bit microcontrollers. However, NXP did not make comparison with Cortex-M3 based microcontrollers which it can also supply.
"The Cortex-M0 processor core and system architecture take full advantage of today's optimized low-power design tools, techniques, and the latest low-power, high-density silicon flash process," said Geoff Lees, vice president and general manager of the microcontroller product line at NXP, in a statement.
The LPC1100 family is supported by development tools from IAR, Keil, Hitex, Code Red and others. NXP said it would supply a development tool platform for under $30.
Related links and articles:
Energy Micro launches ARM-based Gecko microcontrollers
Energy Micro licenses Cortex-M3 for microcontroller attack ARM extends Cortex-M3 to low power applications
Luminary declines to license ARM's tiny core
ARM preps tiny core for low-power microcontrollers
The Stellaris family of microcontrollers
Comments
Dan at ECS
11/16/2009 11:49 AM EST
Anyone remember the $1 CM3 parts from Luminary Micro (now TI?) I don't remember the quantity to get that price point, I'd guess it was 100K... but anyway, I went to TI's website the other day & noticed that the cheapest CM3 MCU was priced at $2. Maybe that was 1K pricing through distribution, but still... for a cost-constrained part, I was surprised to see "no $1 parts" anymore.
Anyone here from TI/former Luminary want to clarify?
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vrover
11/22/2009 11:07 PM EST
I have followed the articles about NXP with some interest. I have been a user of many Signetics and Philips parts over the years. I had hoped that with independence, NXP would be able to return to its roots as a semiconductor supplier.
But, it seems to me that NXP is already out of business, at least as far as the US market is concerned. They have no local representation or technical support, rather relying on a few major US distributors for that. Of course, distributors are not equipped or inclined to do this. The web page tech and product support is completely non-functional as well. Inquiries are never answered. And, the web page response times are often so slow that you think that the page is not found.
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ukzw
12/14/2009 10:10 AM EST
I remember heard of $1 ARM MCU from NXP many years ago but never found where to buy. So I still have to go with Microchip until now where I can physically buy MCU for under $1.
I wish to move on to ARM if their price can match PIC so hope this time what NXP said is true.
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