Homes often have interconnected smoke detectors, to remotely alert the resident about remote smoke events. When an alarm is falsely triggered, also known as “nuisance tripping,” it is difficult to determine which smoke detector set off the alarm. The alarm-memory feature available on the RE46C16X ICs enables the detector that caused the fault to be easily identified, which greatly reduces costs associated with installing and troubleshooting these types of smoke-detector systems. A charge-dump feature allows the alarm on all interconnected devices to stop sooner.
Microchip already offers a broad line of PIC® microcontrollers (MCUs), horn drivers, other smoke-detector ICs, signal-chain and power-management products, providing complete smoke-detector solutions for residential devices to programmable commercial devices.