XMOS unveils industrial multicore mcus

The family is made up of 6, 8, 10, 12 and 16 core multicore microcontrollers, all of which are equipped with an integrated a/d converter, power management circuitry and a range of timers. "The integration of analogue functionality alongside the deterministic xCORE architecture opens up multicore microcontrollers to a whole new range of developers and application types," commented XMOS ceo Nigel Toon. "xCORE-Analog combines the best of hardware integration and software configurability, offering a degree of intelligence and flexibility that is well beyond traditional mcu solutions." The A-Series devices include up to eight channels of 12bit, 1MS/s a/d conversion; power-on reset, brown-out protection and watchdog facilities; an integrated oscillator; deep sleep memory; and an integrated dc/dc converter. XMOS says these features combine to reduce the number of external components required and allow designs to be implemented using simple, two layer pcbs. The mcus will be available for sampling in Q2 this year, with volume production anticipated for Q4.