Design Automation


Dev kits for 32-bit Gecko MCUs

18 September 2013 Design Automation

Silicon Labs has introduced development kits and application software demonstrations for the EFM32 Wonder Gecko microcontroller (MCU) family, which was developed by Energy Micro, recently acquired by Silicon Labs.

The Wonder Gecko MCU line is based on the ARM Cortex-M4 processor core, which provides a full DSP instruction set and includes a hardware floating point unit (FPU) for faster computation performance. The development kits and software examples are designed to help embedded engineers leverage 32-bit digital signal control with the high-performance CPU and low standby power modes.

To speed up design time, the EFM32 development kits include a built-in J-Link debugger and come with software examples using each kit’s built-in features. These include an audio pre-amplifier equaliser that digitises the audio connector signal with the MCU’s on-chip analog-to-digital converter (ADC) and subsequently generates the output via a digital-to-analog converter (DAC).

There is also an audio frequency analyser using the kit’s audio connector and performing a Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) to display a frequency plot on the development kit’s LCD; and an application example uses the kit’s onboard light sensor for 10 - 500 Hz FFT analysis.

These software demonstrations also enable designers to evaluate the differences between hard and soft floating-point operations and compiler optimisation, as well as the CPU cycle count.

The example projects are coded using algorithms that are part of the Cortex Microcontroller Software Interface Standard (CMSIS) DSP function library. This includes complex FFT, finite impulse response (FIR) filters, matrix and vector operations, and statistical analysis. CMSIS provides a vendor-independent hardware abstraction layer for ARM Cortex-M processors.

Silicon Labs’ complementary Simplicity Studio software suite includes all the necessary CMSIS, board support package (BSP) and documentation for the development kits.

For more information contact NuVision Electronics, +27 (0)11 608 0144, [email protected], www.nuvisionelec.co.za.



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