By using ESI, it automates the measurement process and reduces CPU involvement, which helps to reduce power consumption of the MCU. In water meter designs, coupled to a LC rotation detection sensor, the ESI continuously detects the rotation of the propeller while the rest of the microcontroller is sleeping in low-power mode. This reference design demonstrates a usage example of the ESI to achieve ultra-low power consumption compared with the same detecting methodology using external circuit.
Flow meter reference design uses the world’s lowest-power MCU
In a battery-operated water meter, long battery life is the key. One of the challenges is to continuously measure the water flow information while consuming the least energy possible. The Extended Scan Interface (ESI) sensing peripheral integrated onto the ultra-low-power MSP430 microcontroller from TI is solving this problem.