MCU family is designed specifically for automotive electronics

17th October 2006

ES Admin

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Silicon Laboratories has announced a highly-integrated MCU family designed specifically for automotive electronics. The C8051F52/3x family leverages Silicon Laboratories’ proven track-record for designing high-performance mixed-signal MCUs in a small footprint, which is essential for many automotive electronics applications. By offering the highest functional density, the C8051F52/3x family of MCUs provides customers cost-effective and easy-to-use solutions for designing body electronics and other point-of-control applications including power windows, doors, sunroofs, trunks, seat positioning and mirrors.

The C8051F52x MCU family is the first to combine a ±0.5% integrated precision internal oscillator with 8K Flash, 25 MIPS, 12-bit ADC, dedicated LIN 2.0 controller, 16-bit timers/PWM, SPI, UART, and six I/O lines in a small 3 x 3 mm QFN package. The C8051F53x MCU family has the same feature set but adds ten additional I/O lines and is offered in 20-pin QFN and TSSOP packages. Both families integrate additional analog features such as programmable comparators, voltage regulators, and on-board temperature sensors to further reduce design complexity. This highly-integrated architecture enables automotive electronics designers to simplify the design process and reduce bill of materials.

The C8051F52/3x MCU family provides automotive electronics applications with greater functionality, sensing and control. For example, the integrated LIN 2.0 controller combined with the ultra-high-precision internal oscillator enables designers to implement LIN master-mode communication networks without the need for external timing components, further reducing overall system cost. The C8051F52/3x MCU family also includes power-on-reset, brown-out protection, and a watch-dog timer reset, helping designers to create reliable and durable electronics systems. In addition, Silicon Laboratories’ patented MCU technology has been field tested and optimized for rigorous automotive specifications and maintains full performance over the complete automotive temperature range (-40 to +125 ºC).

“Ultimately, solutions that accomplish the application requirements at the lowest system cost will drive the next wave of electronics in automobiles,” said Derrell Coker, vice president of Silicon Laboratories. “We bring a new level of sophistication in electrical applications to the automotive industry, offering several industry firsts in integration and performance for point-of-control applications. Silicon Laboratories redefines what is possible by offering capabilities not addressed by competing solutions.”

Silicon Laboratories provides tools to support the C8051F52/3x MCU family, offering a fully integrated development environment that interfaces to the on-chip debug module via a USB to serial debug adapter. A device-specific development kit (C8051F530DK) is also available to facilitate software and application development.