I hope all is well with you. I just wanted to write you and say I hope you liked Hurt Locker and if you did and want us to win, please tell (name deleted) and your friends who vote for the Oscars, tell actors, directors, crew members, art directors, special effects people, if everyone tells one or two of their friends, we will win and not a $500M film, we need independent movies to win like the movies you and I do, so if you believe The Hurt Locker is the best movie of 2010, help us! I'm sure you know plenty of people you've worked with who are academy members whether a publicist, a writer, a sound engineer, please take 5 minutes and contact them. Please call one or two persons, everything will help!

best regards,
Nicolas Chartier Voltage Pictures

So, it's with great self pride, that I petition all of you to vote for PSoC 3, PSoC 5 and PSoC Creator in the EDN Innovation Awards.  Tell your friends, co-workers, bosses, significant others, etc. to vote.  You can vote here: www.edn.com/innovation20 (voting ends March 19th, so go vote now, before you forget).  PSoC is like The Hurt Locker for this EDN award.  We are the smaller company competing against the titans in the microcontroller business.  But I firmly believe that PSoC, and the design methodology that PSoC uses, is superior.

In the end, Nicolas Chartier was banned from attending the Oscars.  And with any luck, I might be banned from having to attend the EDN awards too.

 Introduction to Programmable Signal Chains

A signal chain, or signal-processing chain, is a common term you have probably heard before used to describe a series of signal-conditioning components in a mixed-signal design that are used for analog signal acquisition, processing, and control.

• Adapt to change easier
• Get to market faster
• Deal with analog complexity
• Protect your design IP

 Presenters:

Matt Branda is the Marketing Director for PSoC programmable system-on-chip devices at Cypress Semiconductor. Since joining Cypress in 2000, he has held positions in various product marketing and business development roles for the company's USB, wireless and PSoC solutions. Matt holds a Bachelors of Electrical Engineering from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, New York. 

 Mark Hastings is an Applications Engineer MTS for PSoC Programmable System-on-Chip at Cypress Semiconductor. Since joining Cypress in 1998, he worked with the first Cypress USB microcontrollers, and then in 2001 joined Cypress MicroSystems working on PSoC. Mark first worked on developing content (libraries of pre-configured analog and digital peripherals) for PSoC 1, PSoC 3, and PSoC 5, with a focus on analog. In 2009 he took a position in the PSoC applications team focused on expanding the analog capabilities and applications of Cypress's PSoC portfolio. Mark holds a Bachelors of Electrical Engineering from Washington State University.

There are a lot of new features and enhancements that we ve worked on since our last update.  One of these new features is the Internet-enabled, Live Start Page that you see when you first open up the software tool.  PSoC Creator 2.0 reaches out to cypress.com and pulls a list of articles regarding released application notes, kits and solutions, videos, training and other discussions focused on getting you started and helping you make the most of your PSoC-based solution.  If you don t have Internet access, then you ll see an offline version of the start page similar to what you saw in PSoC Creator 1.0.

This is just one of the new features in PSoC Creator 2.0.  Discover more and learn more at www.cypress.com/go/psoccreator.  Enjoy!

• AN237: Migrating from 8051 to Cortex Microcontrollers
• AN234: Migrating from PIC Microcontrollers to Cortex-M3

We will have a booth at the expo, which is open to the public (and free!) on September 27th and 28th.  We have some exciting new stuff to announce, so keep an eye out for upcoming press releases.

I'll be at the show both days, working the booth.  We'll be demonstrating some of the coolest applications PSoC can do.  If you are in the Boston are those days, please stop in and say hi!  We'll be in booth #400.  You can learn more about ESC Boston here: esc.eetimes.com/boston/

The new address for these webinars is http://cypress.webex.com/meet/training.  Enjoy!

This week's webinar is on Thursday, June 9th at 9:00am PDT.  The topic is on low power designs with PSoC 3 and PSoC 5.  You can access the webinar from this link.  In case anyone has problems with the link, they can always access the meeting by going to http://cypress.webex.com and entering meeting number 498 741 435.  These are VoIP meetings, so all you need is speakers or headphones.

We've had positive feedback on these webinars to date, so I hope you can join.

-Bobby

We will initially host them at 9:00am (Pacific Time) on Thursdays.  Our first one will be this Thursday, May 19th.  We will add additional time slots to support different parts of the world.

All webinars will be hosted via WebEx.  You can access the webinar from this link.  In case anyone has problems with the link, they can always access the meeting by going to http://cypress.webex.com and entering meeting number 498 741 435.

For this week's topic, we will give an overview-level description of the PSoC 3 & PSoC 5 bootloader system, as implemented by PSoC Creator.  We'll cover the architecture, how it works, and major features.  Then we'll follow up by building a simple demonstration project for the I2C bootloader.  The webinar will also allow you to ask questions to our bootloader experts.

I look forward to seeing you there!

-Bobby

The three Community Choice finalists are:

• Electronic Alto Recorder
• Spectral Eye
• Full CAN Bus for Electric Cars

Since I grew up in Chicago, my motto is vote early and vote often!

Community Choice

• Touch-sensitive electronic Alto recorder with true analog sound synthesizer 
• Spectral_Eye 
• Implementing FULL CAN bus in PSoC 5 for electric vehicle development 
   

Use of Analog

• Drum Tuner 
• MultiLogger 
• Musical Instrument Tuner 
   

Use of Digital

• Mixed analog-digital scope 
• LIMB – Low-Cost Intelligent Monitor for Babies 
• PSoC 5 Webcam
   

Use of Components

• Electronic implementation of the game “Connect 4” using a color OLED 
• PSoC5 Super Spy Car with Bluetooth control and monitoring by mobile phone. 
• jmSCAG for PSoC 

After Phase 1, we'll pick the top 100 submission.  Those chosen will advance to Phase 2 and receive a free PSoC 5 Development Kit for their design.  If you haven't already submitted a design abstract, I hope you consider doing so now that you have an extra few weeks.

For more information, visit www.cypress.com/go/challenge.

There are four devices currently available:

• CY8C3866AXI-040ES3
• CY8C3866LTI-030ES3
• CY8C3866LTI-068ES3
• CY8C3866PVI-021ES3

Get'em while they're hot!

Today we move one step closer.  We started sampling PSoC 5 this summer, but now it's far enough along for us to kick-off this design challenge with it.  I really hope you considered submitting a design.  The challenge has over $10,000 in prizes.  Even if you are unable to create a design, you can still win money by participating in the Cypress Community.  Even something as simple as rating another's designs might win you money.

If only Cypress employees where eligible...

http://blogs.arm.com/arm-events/cypress-psoc-5-device-development-board-availability-milestone-achieved/

 

Stay classy my PSoC brethren.   

It was a great trip but I'm extremely happy to be back...

Jim

Last week, we had our world-wide FAE Conference here at the factory in San Jose.  During one of the meetings, we showed our new ePSG (written about in a previous blog post).  It was a controversy immediately.  Within seconds people questioned our claim that the device could support 12 UARTs, or 28 PWMs.

During the meeting, I decided to prove them wrong.  I quietly loaded up PSoC Creator on my laptop and started working on a couple of new projects.  Needless to say, I was able to prove both of the claims.  I figured it was worth sharing the results with you.

12 UARTs in a Single PSoC 3 Device
Here is my working design that contains 12 UARTs.  I was able to build it and route it.  You can see the build report too.

Just to provided that this worked, here is the build report.

28 PWMs in a Single PSoC 3 Device
Everyone said it's impossible.  I had to prove them wrong.  Below is a working design that has 28 8-bit PWMs.  PSoC Creator schematic is below.

Once again, here is the build report.

We're really just starting to lear everything that can be done with the UDBs.  Of course, if you don't like our components, you can go off and write your own in Verilog.  And with the coming release of PSoC Creator Beta 5, we'll offer a Datapath Configuration Tool, that will really let you unleash the power of a UDB in your own custom component.

 

This thing is amazing. I don’t know when it will be released, but when it does I’m buying at least 2.  It better be within the next couple of weeks, because I have a sick project that this thing will be perfect for. 

We had a couple of demos on display.  One precision analog demo and the other a QVGA graphics control and drive demo both with the PSoC 5 powered by the ARM Cortex-M3 processor running off of the PSoC Development Kit.  If you made it out to San Jose for this week's ESC-SV, I hope you stopped by and grabbed a PSoC 3 / PSoC 5 t-shirt.  If not, find us in Chicago in June or in Boston in September.

For a teaser of what we had on display, a video captured the highlights:

 ...and the free beer by fellow exhibitors on Tuesday was great--long lines, but free! 

Segue into a side project that I’ve been working on: the Electronic Product Selector Guide.  Also referred to as the ePSG since I have a penchant for acronyms that almost rivals my need for ridiculously old Persian rugs (yes, my apartment is decked out with a large fish tank and Persian rugs… trust me, I’ve done it in a really classy way). 

The ePSG is a cool tool that allows someone (read: you) to quickly take their basic requirements for a design and have the online tool give you a list of several PSoC 3 and PSoC 5 parts that are suitable for the design.  What really makes this helpful though, is that I’ve removed the need to ‘understand’ PSoC’s analog and digital blocks.  The user can select the number of PWMs, I2C, CAN, PGAs, ADCs, etc that they need for a design, and the tool determines which parts your selections fit into.  The other cool part is that the tool shows you how many of each peripheral you can fit into the superset parts on the fly. 

An example: the first image shows the maximum number of each digital peripheral that you can select.  The second image shows that as I select different peripherals, the number of free UDBs is reduced (as shown by the dark grey bar).  Therefore the tool will not let me make any selections that yield no results.

Go on and try it out.  I will be updating this tool with more functionality throughout the coming year (along with the help of my web team).  Let me know if you have any cool ideas for enhancements… or don’t.  The choice is up to you.

 Podbelski out.

Here’s an excerpt from his design explanation:

“A single VDAC can be used to create 4 additional VDACs by using the CT/CT [programmable analog] blocks as Track and Hold components.  Using a LUT as a simple state machine, it generates DMA requests and Track/Hold pulses to properly sequence through the four outputs.  The data for the four DACs is kept in an array that is easily set in software.

The DMA automatically refreshes each of the DACs with the array [values] at a high enough rate that the Sample and Hold output will not decay significantly.  In the test project the Track and Hold components were refreshed every 8 uSec.  Since DMA is doing all the work keeping the DACs refreshed, the CPU overhead is zero until an output is updated by the CPU which is exactly the same overhead as updating a normal DAC.  The other three unused DAC [peripherals] may be used as VDACs or IDACs for a total of seven DACs.

Unlike PWM DACs [which can also be implemented with our programmable architecture] these don’t require an external RC filter and actually have a lower output impedance than the standard VDACs without using an op-amp.  The down side [to this implementation] is that they [the 4 additional VDACs] incur the input offset error of a couple mVolts of the CT [programmable analog] blocks and of course they use up a CT block for each VDAC output.  This method could easily be scaled from 2 to 4 VDACs.”

The value of the programmable analog blocks in our PSoC devices is often not fully understood, but with implementations like the above (and there are many other examples such as this) it’s easier to see what can be done and why we spend so much effort in ensuring our programmable fabric spans across the analog and digital domains. Within the PSoC 3 and PSoC 5 category, you’ll find a mix of parts that have 0 to 4 VIDACs and 0 to 4 programmable analog blocks as well as many other variations to help you in selecting the right size programmable part so you get the maximum value in the smallest device.  View the parts available in the parametric tables here: PSoC 3-www.cypress.com/go/psoc3 and PSoC 5-www.cypress.com/go/psoc5.

What I love about PSoC is its analog capabilities.  Sure, I’m partial to the product as they keep paying me to keep my anachronistic oil painting addition going (who wouldn’t want a painting of James Joyce using an iPad?), but it really is cool that PSoC pulls in so much analog.  It’s really all about integrating components that are traditionally outside of a microcontroller allowing for smaller and more concise designs.  At a high level, sensors are traditionally an easy example to show this as an example.  Analog sensors, for the most part, need to be conditioned before being digitized.  Some times this involves an amplifier, filter and an ADC, other times it’s just a PGA before a comparator.  Regardless of which design topology is being used, PSoC can be configured by the user to handle this flow.  The components (ADC, PGA, comparator, OpAmp, filters, etc) are all able to be placed in a design and the signals can be routed in any configuration needed.  You want to route a signal to a PGA then an OpAmp then to an ADC? Done. You want to route a signal from a OpAmp to a PGA then to a comparator? Done.  You want to link together 3 comparators, a PGA and an ADC? Wait, you want to do that?  It makes no sense, but you can do it.  That’s what’s cool about the analog: the flexibility to treat it like individual components on a bread board.

PSoC’s analog allows the ability to come up with new means to interface and condition analog signals inside of a single chip.  Oh and its has a microcontroller.