Design
Atmel QTouch Studio 4.3 Software Tool Eases Touch Designs
Atmel launched the Atmel QTouch Studio 4.3--the industry's first touch design software tool to support the complete touch design flow. Another first is the Touch Validation Wizard, a feature in the Atmel QTouch Studio 4.3 to help assess design quality by reporting capacitance, noise and reference levels, as well as notifying the user of design marginalities. The software tool is so easy to use that design engineers do not need an expert level of understanding of touch technologies to quickly and effectively integrate touch functionality into their applications.
Synopsys DFTMAX compression cuts pin-limited test cost by 95 percent at Silicon Image
Synopsys today announced that Silicon Image, Inc., a leading provider of semiconductors and IP for the secure distribution, presentation and storage of high definition content, employed DFTMAX(tm) compression, an integral part of the Galaxy(tm) Implementation Platform, to significantly lower manufacturing test cost and time. Silicon Image's mixed-signal multimedia design testing requirements included a tight form factor and a limited number of package pins. Using the new pin-limited test capability in Synopsys' DFTMAX, Silicon Image designers easily implemented test compression for the mixed-signal chip in just two days, substantially reducing test time, data and cost while achieving high test coverage.
Guifx Announces Deana UI Kit for iPad
Guifx, an interface design studio specializing in touchscreen interfaces for home automation and embedded systems, today announced that its Deana User Interface (UI) Kit™ is now available for the iPad™. Providing uncompromising convenience at home or away, Deana is currently compatible with Crestron's Mobile Pro® G iPad application, with other manufacturers to follow.
Adeneo Embedded provides Windows Embedded CE 6.0 drivers for TI’s WiLink™ 6.0 connectivity solution
Adeneo Embedded, a Microsoft® Windows® Embedded Gold Partner with facilities in Europe and in the USA, today announced availability of its Wi-Fi® and Bluetooth® technology drivers for the WiLink™ 6.0 single-chip solution (WL1271) from Texas Instruments Incorporated (TI) which support Windows Embedded CE 6.0 R3. The customizable, combined solution makes the design of reliable, high-performance wireless communications on the Windows Embedded CE operating system more efficient.
Zuken Introduces Free CADSTAR Express 12.1
The free evaluation version of CADSTAR 12.1 with all the latest functionality, is now available to download from Zuken.com. When companies are making the decision about what software to use, a demo isn't enough. Designers want to get their hands dirty and see if the tools really live up to what the EDA companies are promising. The Express version of CADSTAR is a fully functional CADSTAR (limited to 300 pins and 50 components), allowing designers to see for themselves how easy it is to use and experience its powerful technology enabling capabilities.
AWS available for Wind River’s VxWorks
AdaCore, a leading supplier of Ada development tools and support services, today announced the launch of Ada Web Server (AWS) for Wind River's VxWorks Real-Time Operating System (RTOS). When used in conjunction with the GNAT Pro development environment, AWS enables developers to embed an Ada-based web server within any application, accessible through web browsers. With AWS for VxWorks, users can connect through a direct TCP/IP link to board-level applications for a variety of purposes, such as system control, configuration, and/or maintenance. The two-way interface is both lightweight and flexible.
Andes Technology Adopts Cadence Digital Front-End Low-Power Flow
Cadence Design Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ: CDNS), a leader in global electronic design innovation, today announced that Andes Technology, a Taiwanese provider of high-performance, low-power 32-bit processor IP and SoC platforms, has adopted the Cadence® digital front-end low-power design flow. The flow, based on the Common Power Format (CPF), deploys Cadence synthesis, simulation and formal verification technology. It enables Andes to provide its customers a scalable and configurable low-power management framework that blends hardware and software solutions for sophisticated power domain partitions and power scaling schemes.
Cypress's PSoC 3 Architecture Enables Avnet's Spartan-6 LX16 FPGA Evaluation Board to Interface to the Analog World
Cypress Semiconductor announced that a single Cypress PSoC 3 programmable system-on-chip integrates precision analog sensing, system management and user interface functions on Avnet's low-power Xilinx Spartan®-6 LX16 FPGA Evaluation Board. The PSoC 3 device performs power management, CapSense® touch-sensing, USB/UART/SPI connectivity and configuration of the Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA) directly on the board. Flexible PSoC 3 I/Os also enable the board to interface to the "analog world" through an expansion connector that accepts an included Avnet LCD board, user prototype boards and various Cypress expansion boards available from Avnet Electronics Marketing.
Silica opens its technical expertise to Designers’ Community
Silica, an Avnet Company (NYSE: AVT), pan-European semiconductor distribution specialist, has launched a designers' community providing unprecedented open access to local in-house engineering expertise. The Silica Designers' Community is integrated into the company's new web site, www.silica.com, and provides a portal to forums, video content and technical resources supported by the distributors own front-line engineers.
Whitepaper - Engineers increasingly vote for prototyping for embedded system debug
For the second year in a row, Byte Paradigm has conducted an online survey to understand the role of using a 'live' prototype for testing and debugging embedded systems. This year, we had a special attention to the equipment that the electronic engineer finds in its lab or on its desk to efficiently test and debug embedded systems. Results show that using a prototype is widely seen as a way to speed up debugging and that digital pattern generators are gaining success for the generation of digital input stimuli.
Visual System Simulator White Paper
End-to-end System Design: Advantages Of An Integrated Tool For Frequency Planning, Budget Analysis And More.
AWR Releases Visual System Simulator 2010
AWR Corporation, the innovation leader in high-frequency EDA, today announced the commercial release of its 2010 Visual System Simulator™ (VSS) software. The release offers new capabilities that increase productivity for RF system designers; including time delay neural network (TDNN™) advanced amplifier behavioral models for capturing memory effects and measurement data interchange format (MDIF) model support, as well as a new phased array element for radar design engineers.
Avnet Embedded Benelux seminar gives specialist insight into the latest embedded technologies
Avnet Embedded, an Avnet, Inc. (NYSE:AVT) company, is bringing its Embedded Technical Seminar to Brussels after its success in The Netherlands. In partnership with Silica, Avnet Embedded will also be joined by Alten PTS, Alten Belgium, Intel and Windows® Embedded for the one-day free of charge seminar for embedded developers being held on 21st September 2010 at the Business Faculty in Brussels.
C2000 Peripheral Explorer Kit and Free Teaching ROM give developers a head start in learning and launching real-time control applications
Giving students and new real-time control developers an easy-to-use, cost-efficient foundation for jumpstarting designs, Texas Instruments announced its enhanced floating-point F28335 Delfino™ microcontroller (MCU) Peripheral Explorer Kit and free C2000 MCU Teaching ROM.
Whitepaper: COM Express COM.0 Revision 2.0
PICMG® adopts new specification for COM Express™ modules. What is new?
National Semiconductor’s WEBENCH LED Architect Simplifies and Speeds Lighting Design
National Semiconductor Corp. today announced the addition of WEBENCH LED Architect to its award-winning portfolio of online WEBENCH Designer tools. The first of its kind, WEBENCH LED Architect enables both novice and expert designers to perform real-time comparisons and optimize complex lighting systems for performance, size and cost in minutes.
Tiny M3-F focus module developer's kits now available from stock
New Scale Technologies, Inc. today announced that developer's kits for its miniature M3-F focus module are available for purchase online, shipping from stock. Each kit includes an M3-F module for precision closed-loop lens motion, along with a USB adapter and New Scale Pathway software for easy evaluation and prototyping. Configured for I2C or SPI serial interface, the modules in the developer's kits accommodate M12 or smaller lenses and image sensors up to 17 x 17 mm.
ITTIA unveiled DB version 3.2
ITTIA, a global supplier of embedded database software, today unveiled the version 3.2 release of its leading edge relational database, ITTIA DB SQL, for application developers of embedded systems and devices. This release introduces transaction savepoints and two new ways to share data on a device, with support for shared memory communications and a low-overhead storage-level locking model.
New Version of EPLAN Electric P8
EPLAN's new version of Electric P8 2.0 software offers practical potential whether for enhanced project reliability, functionality and speed point wiring and active device protection or for channel oriented PLC design. The quality of all documentation is guaranteed by active check functions and the system automatically prevents incorrect data from being entered.
Synopsys DesignWare SATA IP enables first-pass silicon success for Global Unichip Corporation
Synopsys announced that Global Unichip Corporation (GUC) has achieved first-pass silicon success for its GP5080 Solid State Drive (SSD) system-on-chip (SoC) utilising the complete Synopsys DesignWare(r) SATA IP solution, consisting of controller, PHY and verification IP. GUC, a leading full-service SoC design foundry, determined that Synopsys' DesignWare SATA IP was superior in quality, power consumption, performance and feature set. SATA interoperability was a key requirement for GUC, and Synopsys was the only provider to offer an integrated solution consisting of a controller and PHY IP that has passed the SATA International Organization (SATA-IO) Building Block interoperability testing, an independent demonstration of full SATA functionality. By integrating Synopsys' DesignWare SATA IP solution into GUC's SSD SoC Platform, GUC was able to focus their internal expertise on delivering their SSD SoC platform within an aggressive six-month development time-to-market window.
Synopsys Announces Immediate Availability of DesignWare MIPI M-PHY IP in 40-nm Process Technology
Synopsys announced immediate availability of the DesignWare MIPI M-PHY® IP for next-generation high-speed interfaces based on the newly ratified MIPI® Alliance M-PHY specification. With this latest addition to the DesignWare MIPI IP portfolio, Synopsys is the first provider to offer a comprehensive solution of a controller and PHY IP for both the MIPI DigRF(SM) v3 (2.5G/3.0G) and v4 (4G) standards. Incorporating both standards in a mobile device brings the benefit of the faster 4G standards while preserving broad coverage by using 2.5G/3.0G as a fallback mode.
Magma - Quartz iPOP Initiative – Delivers “improved Productivity, Operability and Performance” for Faster, Higher Capacity Physical Verification
Magma Design Automation today launched Quartz iPOP, the "improved Productivity, Operability and Performance" initiative to facilitate designers' adoption of the Quartz™ DRC and Quartz LVS software for designs targeted at 65 nanometers (nm) and below. Magma's Quartz products, the first truly scalable physical verification solutions, handle larger designs and provide turnaround time up to an order of magnitude faster than traditional solutions – without sacrificing accuracy or requiring additional hardware. These unique capabilities provide the improved productivity and performance necessary to cope with the higher verification burden for designs at 65 nm and smaller without increasing the physical verification budget.
Magma’s Titan Qualified for TowerJazz Reference Flow
Magma Design Automation today announced TowerJazz, the global specialty foundry leader, has qualified the Titan™ Mixed-Signal Design Platform for TowerJazz's Power Management Analog/Mixed-Signal (AMS) Reference Flow and process design kits (iPDKs) for its 180-nanometer (nm) technologies. Magma's Titan software and TowerJazz's foundry technology provide mutual customers with a comprehensive design and manufacturing solution that enables users to accelerate the design-to-silicon process and achieve first-time silicon success.
CST - Technical Webinar Series on Electromagnetic System
Computer Simulation Technology (CST) announces a major new webinar series focusing on today's most challenging 3D Electromagnetic problems in RF system design, EMC, and signal integrity. Current electronic devices can include multiple antennas, very high data rate circuitry, high density IC packages, and strict federal requirements on emissions and susceptibility. Larger systems incorporating many electronic circuits, face problems of interoperability, cable harness interference, behavior of novel materials, and lightning protection. Devices and systems can range in size by several orders of magnitude.
Agilent Technologies Introduces IC-CAP WaferPro Software for Automating Complex Device Modeling Applications
Agilent Technologies Inc. today announced Integrated Circuit Characterization and Analysis Program (IC-CAP) Wafer Professional (WaferPro) software. The new software provides a multi-site, multi-wafer, automated DC and RF measurement solution for semiconductor device modeling applications.
National Instruments UK & Ireland To Present LabVIEW Developer Days
Taking place in eight locations around the UK and Ireland, the National Instruments LabVIEW Developer Day offers free introductory and advanced technical sessions designed to help engineers and scientists improve product skills, knowledge and productivity using the award-winning LabVIEW graphical programming software.
ChipWrights Stacks Linux Application Development Kit with Major Enhancements for IPTV Set-Top Boxes and IP Cameras
ChipWrights, Inc New Linux® Application Development Kit for the CW5631 System-on-Chip provides the components to develop low-cost IPTV set-top boxes and IP cameras and significantly improve time to market. The Kit—based on the OpenEmbedded build system—leverages thousands of open source packages.
Reducing Switching Power with Intelligent Clock Gating
Xilinx introduces the first automated, fine-grain clock-gating solution that can reduce dynamic power by up to 30 percent for Virtex®-6 and Spartan®-6 FPGA designs
Partial Reconfiguration of Virtex FPGAs in ISE 12
This white paper addresses the flexible partial reconfiguration options when designing with Virtex®-6, Virtex-5, and Virtex-4 FPGAs.
AMD Unlocks 3D Internet Potential with OpenGL ES 2.0 Driver
At SIGGRAPH 2010, AMD today announced availability of the first software driver for desktop computing environments to support the WebGL industry standard, which is designed to bring plugin-free 3D graphics to the Internet. The AMD OpenGL® ES 2.0 driver is intended to help developers easily create exciting 3D content that can be rendered more quickly for consumers using open-source web browsers, thereby helping create an application-like browser experience.
AMD Spurs Software Development to Benefit from Heterogeneous Compute Architectures and APUs
AMD today announced the availability of the ATI Stream Software Development Kit (SDK) v2.2 with full OpenCL™ 1.1 support to provide developers with the tools they need to build incredible next-generation applications. By taking advantage of both CPU and GPU processing power in a given system, applications like 3D video, HD video chat and multi-display 3D gaming are possible.
Synopsys Launches DesignWare USB Software Alliance Program
Synopsys, Inc. announced the launch of the DesignWare® USB Software Alliance Program with leading USB software providers emsys, Jungo, MCCI and MicroDigital as inaugural members. This alliance program establishes an ecosystem of qualified USB software providers for drivers, firmware and stacks which have proven interoperability with Synopsys' DesignWare USB 2.0 and SuperSpeed USB 3.0 IP. Synopsys and its DesignWare USB Software Alliance Program members can help designers to quickly incorporate USB connectivity into their system-on-chips (SoCs) with less risk and provide consumers with the plug-and-play functionality required for PCs, peripherals, mobile devices and consumer electronic products.
Silicon Labs Offers Comprehensive Symbol Model Library To Accelerate Embedded System Design
Silicon Labs introduced a web-based library of schematic symbols and printed-circuit board (PCB) footprints to help developers designing with Silicon Labs' embedded mixed-signal products streamline application development and accelerate time to market. The online symbol library supports Silicon Labs' latest microcontrollers (MCUs) including the Si10xx wireless MCU family, ultra-low-power F99x/F98x devices and capacitive touch-sense MCUs; USB, Ethernet and LCD interface products; and the Si1102/20 proximity and ambient light sensors.
SchmartBoard to Give Away Development Board for TI Microcontrollers
SchmartBoard has announced a new monthly contest for their new development board which supports Texas Instruments Incorporated's broad microcontroller portfolio, including ultra-low power MSP430, ARM Cortex™-M3-based Stellaris and real-time control C2000 MCU platforms.
UK AEC Industry Makes a Significant Move Towards Building Information Modelling
"The building design, construction and infrastructure industries must improve productivity, while at the same time completing complex projects on time and at or under budget," said Jay Bhatt, senior vice president of AEC Industry Solutions on a recent visit to the UK. He was speaking at a time when a string of big-name contractors and architects including Aedas, WSP, Architype and Halcrow have made investments in Autodesk Revit Software, alongside other products from the Autodesk building information modelling (BIM) portfolio.
Synopsys Adds TDD Support to LTE Model Library
Synopsys, Inc. today announced the availability of the Time Division Duplex (TDD) mode in its Long-term Evolution (LTE) Model Library for physical layer system simulation. The addition of the TDD mode to the proven LTE Model Library enables developers of semiconductors for LTE network equipment and devices to quickly and reliably extend their designs to support this important version of the 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) LTE standard.
Zuken’s CADSTAR 12.1 PCB Design Software Cuts Engineering Costs
Zuken has today announced version 12.1 of CADSTAR, the desktop PCB design suite. Amidst the call for companies to tighten their belts as they climb out of recession, CADSTAR brings new functionality that helps cut design and manufacturing costs. The CADSTAR team has been focused on making customer's design functionality requirements come true, with new functionality for advanced library management and signal integrity verification, ECAD MCAD integration, and improved high-speed routing – at an accessible, affordable price.
Synopsys and Lattice Renew OEM Relationship for FPGA Synthesis Software
Synopsys, Inc. and Lattice Semiconductor Corporation today announced a multi-year extension of Lattice's OEM agreement for the Synopsys Synplify FPGA synthesis tools, which Lattice has been offering to its customers for more than 10 years. Under the terms of the agreement, Lattice Semiconductor will provide specific versions of Synopsys' Synplify Pro and Synplify software as part of its programmable logic design environments, including the recently announced Lattice Diamond™ FPGA design environment. This agreement ensures continued high-quality, reliable and fast logic synthesis solutions for designers targeting Lattice CPLD and FPGA products.
WaveFormer Lite Generates Mixed Signal HDL Test Benches for all FPGA design flows
WaveFormer Lite Generates Mixed Signal HDL Test Benches for all FPGA design flows SynaptiCAD has just released a major upgrade to WaveFormer Lite, it's entry level tool for generating VHDL and Verilog test benches graphically from timing diagrams drawn by the user. Previously only available as part of the Actel Libero package, WaveFormer Lite can now be purchased directly from SynaptiCAD. WaveFormer Lite generates native VHDL and Verilog testbench code, so it's compatible with all FPGA/ASIC vendors and tool flows without requiring any special runtime engines.
Cadence Aligns Workforce to Deliver on EDA360 Vision
Cadence Design Systems, Inc. announced today that it will align product development to deliver on the EDA360 vision. The company will line up research and development (R&D) around the three core tenets of the vision: System Realization, SoC Realization and Silicon Realization.
