$149 Infineon C167 Development Kit With 544 KBytes of Flash

Business Wire, Nov 13, 2000

Business Editors/High Tech Writers

FREMONT, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Nov. 13, 2000

World's Only Instant Prototyping Solution for C167 Designs With

Large External Flash. Supports In-application Programmability (IAP).

Waferscale Integration today introduced a development kit for the rapid prototyping of in-application programmable (IAP) embedded systems using any of Infineon's C166 family of microcontrollers. In-application programming is required in systems that need to remain functional while updating their own firmware. In-application programming is important in applications such as surveillance, data logging, automotive, and industrial control.

Development Kit Contents - The DK4000-C167 Development Kit includes a fully populated C167 development board, Waferscale's FlashLINK JTAG programmer for 10 second in-system programming (ISP) of the PSD device, a serial UART cable for IAP, and a power supply. Also included is Waferscale's CDROM with the company's Windows(R)-based PSDsoft(TM) Express EDA tool, an application to perform in-application programming from a PC, the DK4000-C167 manual, application notes and reference designs. The reference designs can frequently be used as-is for the C167 product application.

The DK4000-C167 development board is populated with a C167CR microcontroller, plus Waferscale's single chip PSD4135G2 with 512 KBytes of flash, a second 32-KByte flash memory array, 8 KBytes of SRAM and a 3,000 gate CPLD. The C167 on the DK4000-C167 board has a CAN bus that is typically used in high speed, real-time control in automotive powertrain applications and industrial control.

The large flash memory on the on-board PSD4135G2 has plenty of room for complex code, real time operating systems, and the recoding of fault records, data logs, and completed processes. Abundant flash memory is important in C167 systems because quite often they are used in networked distributed processing applications with self-diagnosis software that consumes large amounts of flash memory. Waferscale's DK4000-C167 board offers the largest flash memory density of any C167 development board on the market today.

The PSD's on-chip CPLD is used for complex memory mapping. It has sufficient logic to implement custom peripherals such as serial channels, shift registers and mail boxes. The DK4000-C167 board also has an expansion port for additional SRAM, expansion connectors for external peripherals or docking additional prototype boards, an LCD display, DIP switches, LEDs, a UART connector, and a JTAG-ISP port.

Speeds System Development Time - According to Bryan Hahn, Waferscale's PSD Product Marketing Manager, "With the DK4000-C167 Development Kit, designers have an instant prototype for any C166-based design, including the logic design for the in-application programmability. Infineon's C166 family of microcontrollers is one of the best selling 16-bit microcontroller architectures on the market today. The C167 derivative on our development board has both CAN and an analog-to-digital convertor, making it ideal for automotive and industrial control applications. Designers who don't need the CAN or the ADC can always migrate a design done on this board to a less elaborate C161 device.

"The DK4000-C167 board has more than twice as much on-board flash memory as any other C167 development board on the market. This is critical for designs that have large code size or need to maintain large data logs. If a designer needs more the 256 KBytes of flash on Infineon's development board or needs to implement in-application programming which requires two flash chips, he or she will have to build a board -- a costly and time-consuming procedure. With our DK4000-C167 Development Kit, the designer can begin writing code immediately, without having to wait for the final board design. This can shave several months off of the product development cycle. Product development time is further shortened by the inclusion of a ready-to-use reference design that handles the in-application programming of the PSD. Frequently, this IAP design can be used as-is, in the final application, saving additional product development time.

"The solution we have built on this board offers the smallest footprint, most cost effective option for any C166 design that needs in-application programming. C166 MCUs don't have any on chip flash, so updating the code or storing and re-writing large data logs requires external flash memory. Since the microcontroller cannot retrieve code from a flash memory that is being updated, two separate flash memory arrays are required. For example, an automotive diagnostic system that maintains a large data log is not able to execute from the flash memory that contains the data log, when the log is being updated. Therefore, a second flash memory array that is large enough to store the boot code, programming algorithms and enough application software to keep the system running will have to be added. In addition, an external CPLD will also be needed for memory mapping and paging and address decoding, as well as for demuxing latches.