Building on years of expertise in industrial control and networking communications, Motorola says it has developed the first 32-bit microcontroller (MCU) with on-chip Ethernet and CAN networking interfaces, plus 512 KB of Flash memory. The device, called the ColdFire MCF5282 MCU, offers designers a powerful, cost effective option for developing embedded networked systems.
With integrated 10/100 Mbps Ethernet media access controller (MAC) and network-ready applications software, the MCF5282 device is able to bring standards-based networking to a variety of traditional MCU applications. These include food service equipment, security systems, vending machines, exercise equipment and industrial controllers. It also has an ideal feature set for the emerging home automation market. Software is included for networking functions such as web-based user interfaces, network time synchroniSation, and router/gateway functionality for legacy serial protocols.
"In surveys with our customers, embedded Ethernet has consistently ranked as one of the top features they wanted to be integrated into 32-bit MCUs," said Dr Franz Fink, general manager of Motorola's 32-bit Embedded Controller Division. "We've taken that feedback to heart and combined Ethernet, CAN, Flash, UARTs and other popular MCU peripherals together in one of our leading microcontroller architectures."
Traditionally, microcontroller networks have used CAN and UART serial interfaces that have distance and bandwidth limitations. Ethernet - the standard upon which the Internet is built - provides an order of magnitude more bandwidth than common serial network interfaces, and can be used to connect devices over virtually unlimited distances. By combining 32-bit MCU processing power with Ethernet capabilities, the MCF5282 MCU can operate as a web server on any Ethernet network running TCP/IP.
The MCF5282 is the first microcontroller based on the Version 2 (V2) core from Motorola's 32-bit ColdFire family. The V2 ColdFire core is capable of delivering 59 Dhrystone 2,1 MIPS at 66 MHz executing from the on-chip Flash and RAM. It has 512 KB embedded Flash memory and 64 KB of static RAM accessible to core and DMA/Ethernet. In a 17 x 17 x 1,6 mm 256-ball mould array process ball grid array (MAPBGA) package it can operate -40 to +85°C at 66 MHz.
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