NEW PRODUCT – SEGGER J-Link EDU – JTAG/SWD Debugger – Doing some serious development on any ARM-based platform, and tired of ‘printf’ plus an LED to debug?

A proper JTAG/SWD HW debugger can make debugging more of a pleasure and less of a pain. It allows you to program your devices at the click of a button, read or write memory addresses or registers on a live system, temporarily halt program execution at a given location or condition, and much more. Essentially, it’s a direct window into what’s going on inside your MCU at any given moment, giving you a level of access and control that’s not easy to replicate with other debugging methods.

Of the dozens (and dozens!) of debuggers out there (we have literally drawers full of them!), we chose the J-Link for a number of reasons:

• It’s USB based and uses a high-speed MCU internally, not an FTDI convertor like most low cost debugger. More debugging, less waiting!
• It support both JTAG (ARM7/9/11) and SWD (ARM Cortex), and has you covered for any core: ARM7/9/11, Cortex-A5/A8/A9, Cortex-M0/M0+/M1/M3/M4, Cortex-R4
• It’s toolchain, IDE and vendor neutral, so you only need to buy one tool for all of your ARM needs and be done with it forever:
• Support GDB-based debugging and flash programming on Linux, Windows and the Mac via the free GDB Server
• Supports most major IDEs, including Keil, IAR Atmel Studio, Crossworks for ARM
• It includes flash-programming algorithms for most MCUs, and Segger is very pro-active about updating their drivers to support the newest chipsets.
• It just works, and keeps on working, and it’ll be there for you in several years time.

The J-Link is fast. Stepping through breakpoints and reading memory addresses is quick, as is programming the flash memory on the chips. It’s real strength, though, is that it’s so vendor and tool neutral. Most chip vendors today provde low cost (or free) tools, but they also lock you into their chips and force you to accept the choice they’ve made for you. Segger’s J-Link is a nice change in that respect, since you can be reasonably certain it will work with any chip, in any major toolchain, and you’re free to change camp (or OS or IDE) without having to buy a new debugger every time.

Why Would I Want This?

You can do a lot of basic debugging with just printf and an LED, and you may not need a HW debugger to get started, but once you start to working on more complicated projects, you hit a debugging wall pretty quickly.

Your chip might be ending up in the HardFault handler, for example, but without a debugger it can be very hard to trace back exactly what is causing the problems. A debugger allows you to set ‘breakpoints’ in your code, where execution will temporarily stop, and you can check the value of memory or peripherals at that point in time, and then ‘single-step’ through your code line by line, executing your program until you find the place that causes your fault. There’s a lot more to debugging than simple breakpoints, but you can often solve in a few minutes with breakpoints what would take much longer with printf and instrusive blocking mechanisms you insert into your code without a debugger.

Whether you’re using GDB Server (GNU Tools) or an IDE and a commercial toolchain, it’s also just a big convenience, since the J-Link can program the flash for you at the click of a button, reset the device, start execution, and then ‘halt’ on main(). You can do all these steps yourself — programming the device via free tools over UART or via a USB bootloader, etc. — but when you need to do that 40-50 times a day, it can get old quick, and 15 seconds saved make a huge difference when debugging. You can program a small MCU and break on main in 2-3 seconds with a J-Link, which makes the tools more or less invisible, which is a good thing when you have other problems to worry about.

What is the J-Link EDU?

The J-Link usually sells for a few hundred dollars up to four figures, but Segger makes a special, low-cost ‘EDU’ version of ther J-Link available. It’s feature complete (including GDB Server support, unlimited flash breakpoints, etc.) and the same debugger you’d buy for professional use, but it has the following limitations (source: http://www.segger.com/j-link-edu.html):

You may use the J-Link EDU for non profit educational purposes only! Non-profit educational purposes means that you may not use the J-Link EDU and its J-Link software

• direct or indirect in or for a profit organization or business purposes or other undertaking intended for profit
• direct or indirect in any other commercial environment (e.g. office)
• to develop, debug, program or manufacturer a commercial product (or parts thereof)
• to use it to either earn money or reasonably anticipate the receipt of monetary gain from it.

What does this mean? Basically, if you’re making money (or plan to make money) off your project, you’ll need to order the full commercial version, or find a different debugger that suits your needs and budget better. But if you’re working on personal, non-commercial projects, such as publishing some open source designs you’re not selling yourself, you’re good. You don’t need to be a student, and you can even be a paid engineer during the week, using this on the weekend for personal non-commercial projects. As long are your intentions are non-commercial, the J-Link EDU is an excellent choice!

In stock and shipping now!

NEW PRODUCT – LPCXpresso LPC1769 Development Board with LPC-Link – If you want a fast, modern MCU that has just about everything covered for you, the ARM Cortex-M3 based LPC1769 is a pretty reliable choice!

• 120MHz ARM Cortex-M3 MCU with 512 kB flash and 64 kB SRAM
• Full-Speed (12 Mb/s) USB 2.0 with on-chip PHY support USB device, host and OTG
• Ethernet support (with dedicated DMA for high speed memory transfers)
• Four UARTs, CAN 2.0, Three SPI buses, Three I2C buses, and I2S for audio
• 12-bit ADC and 10-bit DAC
• Four HW timers, including one motor control PWM timer with support for three-phase motor control
• Quadrature encoder interface
• RTC with a separate power domain to keep track of the time even when the board is powered down

With a modern, highly efficient Cortex-M3 core, the LPC1769 packs a lot of punch (single cycle 32-bit multiply, etc.), and has all the peripherals you’re likely to need to get just about any sensor hooked up to it, get some motors whirling, and have it talking to the outside world via USB, Ethernet, CAN or UART.

While the LPC1769 doesn’t have the super-handy USB bootloader found on it’s newer, smaller cousin the LPC1347, it does still have a UART-based bootloader built into the ROM memory, so it’s almost impossible to brick the MCU.

The LPCXpresso board includes an on-board SWD/JTAG debugger than can be used to debug your LPC1769 project in NXP’s free LPCXpresso IDE (free for up to 128KB), but you can also debug the board with any other SWD or JTAG debugger using the optional SWD connector, or program the boards via the free Flash Magic tool or an open source utility like lpc2isp.

The LPC1769 isn’t the most beginner friendly devices out there, but for those of us who have microcontroller experience and want to step it up, they are an excellent introduction to proper embedded design and development. Given the popularity of these chips there are quite a few resources out there for them, such as ports of popular open source RTOSes like FreeRTOS, and stacks like LWIP or uIP.

Best of all, this is the same MCU that’s used on most of the mbed boards out there, and the mbed source code has recently been republished under an open source license, so you have a large pool of proven, well-thought-out code to take advantage of trying to build something amazing with this kitchen-sink of an MCU!

Technical Details:

In stock and shipping now!

NEW PRODUCT – LPCXpresso LPC1347 Development Board with LPC-Link – The LPC1347 LPCXpresso board is part of NXP’s LPCXpresso eco-system of low cost development boards based around the free (GCC and Eclipse-based) LPCXpresso IDE. All LPCXpresso boards include an on-board hardware SWD/JTAG debugger, so you don’t need any additional hardware (other than a USB mini-B cable) to start some serious debugging (including setting and stepping through breakpoints, etc.).

The LPCXpresso boards are actually two separate boards, and the debugger (called the LPC-Link) can actually be separated from the LPC1347 MCU half, but this is only useful if you plan to use the debugger with other boards inside the LPCXpresso IDE. The MCU side of the board breakout out every pin on the LPC1347, and is actually a really nice dev board because it’s so minimal! You can do what you want with the MCU, without all kinds of conflicts, and it comes in a pretty breadboard friendly size.

This LPCXpresso is for the LPC1347:

• 72MHz ARM Cortex-M3 MCU with 64 KB flash and 12 KB SRAM
• Full-Speed (12Mb/s) USB 2.0, with ROM-based drivers for USB HID, MSC, CDC and DFU
• Built in USB bootloader makes it easy to update the flash on any PC (no extra HW or SW required!)
• 4KB internal EEPROM
• 12-bit 500k sample/s ADC, 4 HW timers, 2 SPI ports, I2C, and USART

Looking for an affordable general-purpose, USB-enabled MCU that packs a lot of punch in a small package? The LPC1347 is an excellent choice with a highly efficient ARM Cortex-M3 core at up to 72MHz, 64KB flash and 12KB SRAM. What makes it stand out in the crowd of small M3 MCUs? It has built in ROM-based USB drivers that make it relatively easy to implement USB, but more importantly it includes a super-handy USB bootloader that makes the device appear as a USB Mass Storage device with 64KB flash. To update your firmware, just drag and drop your binaries files onto the flash drive, reset, and voila … your device is programmed! No extra HW, no special software, and no worries about being able to de-brick your device in the future!

In traditional Adafruit fashion, though, we wouldn’t just throw something fun at you and say ‘have at it!’. KTOWN has put together a completely open source code base for the LPC1347 (and it’s Cortex M0-based cousins the LPC11U24 and LPC11U37) that makes it easy to get started with this board and MCU from the command-line (using a Makefile), or with several modern IDEs (NXP’s free LPCXpresso IDE, Rowley Associates Crossworks for ARM, The free cross-platform CodeLite IDE, as well as experimental project files for Keil). The code base also includes drivers for a lot of popular Adafruit sensors, like the ADXL345, the BMP085, some OLED and graphic displays, and lot of other goodies!

If you’re new to ARM, and need a bit of hand-holding to get started, this is probably the board you want to pick up: its got that nice built in USB boot-loader, lots of example code, GCC support and a debugger built in.

Technical Details:

• Weight: 19.78g
• Dimensions: 34.33mm / 1.35″ x 138.41mm / 5.44″

In stock and shipping now!

I’ve been on a bit of a sabbatical leave these past few weeks, just to take some time to recharge my creative (and technical) batteries.  I love what I do, and I feel lucky to be able to design, build and test interesting stuff all day long.  Most of all, I love seeing how people take that work and do amazing things with it.  I can’t overstate how grateful I am to be a small part of this amazing community!  But sometimes — even in a situation or job you love, with colleagues you appreciate, etc. — you really need to step back and try to remember what got you excited about this stuff in the first place … to make sure you’re focusing your attention on the right things with the right priorities.

A big part of the reason I wanted to take a bit of a break was to look at all these (literally) hundreds of drivers I’ve written, boards I’ve designed, chunks of code I’ve collected, and see what can I do with it all.  I’ve never had easier access to more data, more easily, but it’s never seemed more challenging to do something genuinely creative and useful with it.  I’ve spent my last few weeks trying to finalize a pair of boards that themselves aren’t terribly interesting (there are probably a couple hundred wireless sensor platforms out there!), but it’s really just a spring-board for some other ideas I wanted to explore trying to visualize some of the amazing invisible stuff that goes on around us.  I posted some technical details up about them on my own website, but honestly the technical side is secondary and I rolled my own just to use the parts I’m familiar with and already have a zillion drivers for.

I’ll post some more details about some of what I wanted to do with these boards once I get the first batch in and have 100 or so assembled later this month, but I thought it would be fun to mention what I was up to all the same … even if in this case the core platform isn’t really the main objective!  LPC1xxx 1GHZ Wireless Board Preview

Freescale’s Insanely Tiny ARM Chip Will Put the Internet of Things Inside Your Body.

Chipmaker Freescale Semiconductor has created the world’s smallest ARM-powered chip, designed to push the world of connected devices into surprising places.
Announced today, the Kinetis KL02 measures just 1.9 by 2 millimeters. It’s a full microcontroller unit (MCU), meaning the chip sports a processor, RAM, ROM, clock and I/O control unit — everything a body needs to be a basic tiny computer.

The KL02 has 32k of flash memory, 4k of RAM, a 32 bit processor, and peripherals like a 12-bit analog to digital converter and a low-power UART built into the chip. By including these extra parts, device makers can shrink down their designs, resulting in tiny boards in tiny devices.

Makers of addressable LED projects have an unhealthy obsession with speed. Which code is fastest? Which hardware? If I tweak this just so, I can shave 2 milliseconds per frame! You can stop obsessing, because Paul Stoffergen’s latest simply buries all others.

Well now … this series or articles from Chris Shore (ARM) looks like something after my own heart: Efficient coding for ARM platforms, Part One!

There have always been dozens of ARM options out there for development boards, but — for a variety of reasons — it’s always been a niche interest in the mainstream DIY community. 2012, however, may go down as the the year that ARM and 32-bit finally makes lasting inroads into hobbyists electronics.

There have been a lot of high-profile development tools and established environments embracing ARM in a more official capacity this year than any point in the past, and it’s probably never been easier or cheaper to benefit from the amazing processing power per dollar ratio that modern, low-end ARM Cortex M processors offer.

Interested in taking the 32-bit plunge?  Hopefully this guide will give you a better idea of what options you have!

Arduino Due

Probably the highest profile ARM adopter this year has been the official Arduino board, the Arduino Due.  There have always been ARM-based Arduino boards or at least Arduino-footprint compatible boards out there, but the Due is different in that it has the official stamp of approval and backing of the core Arduino team, which makes it the easiest to purchase option for anyone familiar with Arduino and wanting to be certain that there will be a sufficient number of users online to make using it easy.  Based on an 84MHz ARM Cortex M3 processor from Atmel, it packs a lot more punch than the classic 8-bit Arduino UNO, but should be just as easy to get started with.  This is the safest bet if you’re just looking for some extra processing power, without having to dig into the intricacies of dealing with low-level peripherals yourself.

Teensy 3.0

The Teensy has always had a good following behind it, but the latest incarnation — the ARM Cortex M4 base Teensy 3.0 — is the most capable device yet.  It uses a Freescale Kinetis K-series chip (PK20DX128VLH5), which is based on the ARM Cortex M4.  The M4 differs from the more common Cortex M3 chips by adding some DSP-like instructions, and options for single-precision floating-point acceleration in HW.  Like previous versions of the Teensy, it allows you to use an IDE you’re probably familiar with from the Arduino platform, but is perhaps a bit more friendly if you want to get a bit closer to the bare metal without having to dive straight into the deep-end.

Raspberry Pi

The 500-lbs ARM gorilla in the room in 2012 is of course the insanely popular, incredibly powerful, surprisingly easy to use Raspberry Pi.

Aside from having a great team behind it, and a huge following in the larger HW, computer science and DIY world, it almost certainly represents the best processing-power-to-dollar ratio out there ($35 … come on!).

Need some serious processing power without having to learn all the ins and outs of getting embedded Linux up and running yourself?  Want to mess around with rich SW or OS development or add easy network connectivity without worrying about breaking expensive HW?  Want to get start working with modern HDMI displays or any LCD television for custom games on the cheap?  You can’t do better than the Pi, and as it looks close to hitting 1,000,000 boards sooner than anyone could have imagined, you can be sure answers to your questions are out there.

Added Bonus?  Adafruit has a great Raspbian-based distro called Occidentalis that makes developing with the Pi painless and you’ll be having fun writing your own code in no time!

Have a look at our many Raspberry Pi tutorials in the learning system to get started!

LPCXpresso

Interested in real bare-metal ARM development without breaking the bank?  The LPCXpresso family has really taken off in recent years, and includes a wide variety of ARM Cortex M0 and ARM Cortex M3 chips from NXP’s popular LPC family, combined with a free Eclipse-based IDE and an on-board HW-debugger so that you can step through your code line-by-line and start doing complex development and debugging for about 20 EUR/$30.

There are a number of boards available in the ecosystem, but if you’re looking for the best value I’d suggest the LPC1769-based boards.  The boards are all the same price, but the 120MHz ARM Cortex M3 based LPC1769 has every peripheral you’re likely to want, including a generous 512KB of flash and 64KB of SRAM.  Have a look at the LPCXpresso Forum for a fairly active online community around these popular boards and chips.

This is a good option if you want something that you can easily migrate to a manufacturable, commercial product, though the learning curve is higher as well.

The boards are available from a number of retailers, so a quick search on Google should turn up something local, or via a distributor like Mouser.

MBED

Also based on the popular LPC1000 family from NXP, MBED is a very easy to use online platform with two chips available.  The same LPC1769 mentionned above, and the smaller, very power efficient Cortex M0-based LPC11U24.  This is an extremely easy way to prototype and test ideas, with a lot of libraries available for complex tasks like NFC communication (we have an mbed kit for this based around the Adafruit PN532 Breakout), Internet access, Bluetooth, and almost anything else you can think of.

While the online environment is very easy to use and quite pleasant if you’re mobile, mbed now also offers the option to export your online projects to an offline toolchain or IDE, including project export options for LPCXpresso and GCC, and Keil’s commercial uVision IDE, amongst other popular toolchains.

The LPC1769 based mbed modules can be purchased from Adafruit, and the LPC11U24 modules are available from many online distributors and should be easy to locate somewhere on your continent!

Books

If you’re really interested in understanding the details of ARM’s most common deeply embedded processors, the ARM Cortex M0 (low power, and low cost) and the ARM Cortex M3 (much larger instruction set), the two best books you can purchase are the ‘Definitive Guides’ from ARM-employee Joseph Yiu: The Definitive Guide to the ARM Cortex-M0 and The Definitive Guide to the ARM Cortex-M3 (be sure to get the second edition of the latter!).

They’re both excellent books and very accessible, and any geek would be happy to find either or both of these under they’re Christmas tree!  I’m crossing my fingers hoping for an M4 version, but the beauty of ARM is that each chip builds upon the instruction set of lower versions, so the information covered in the previous books applies to the M4 as well … although it’s worth having both the M0 and M3 books since they both contain very valuable information.

SHIPPING DEADLINES

Here are your 2012 shipping deadlines for ordering from Adafruit. Please review our shipping section if you have specific questions on how and where we ship worldwide for this holiday season.

UPS ground (USA orders): Place orders by Friday 11am ET – December 14, 2012 – Arrive by 12/24/2012 or sooner.

UPS 3-day (USA orders): Place orders by Wednesday 11am ET – December 19, 2012 – Arrive on 12/24/2012.

UPS 2-day (USA orders): Place orders by Thursday 11am ET – December 20, 2012 – Arrive on 12/24/2012.

UPS overnight (USA orders): Place orders by Friday 11am ET – December 21, 2012 – Arrive on 12/24/2012.

UPS International: Place orders by Monday 11am ET – December 17, 2012. Can take up extra time due to worldwide delays and customs. Should arrive by 12/24/2012 or sooner.

Please note: We do not offer Saturday service for UPS.
Tuesday, Dec. 25, 2012, Christmas, no UPS pickup or delivery service.
Tuesday, Jan. 1, 2013, New Year’s Day, no UPS pickup or delivery service.

United States Postal Service, First Class and Priority (USA orders): Place orders by Friday – December 14, 2012 – Arrive by 12/24/2012 or sooner.

USPS First class mail international (International orders): Place orders by Friday – November 23, 2012. Can take up to 30 days ore more with worldwide delays and customs. Should arrive by 12/24/2012 or sooner, but not a trackable service cannot be guaranteed to arrive by 12/24/12.

USPS Express mail international(International orders): Place orders by Friday – December 14, 2012. Can take up to 15 days or more with worldwide delays and customs. Should arrive by 12/24/2012 or sooner.

Gift Certificates are always available at any time.

When in doubt contact us!

Good article from EE Times about the design history of ARM:

It is arguable that ARM and Intel, the two companies locked in head-to-head processor competition, represent two different poles and philosophies.

ARM is modestly British while Intel is brashly American. Intel’s chips have been dominant in personal computers for decades while ARM’s architecture has been market leader in cellphones and smartphones. ARM is skilled at low power and power efficiency and is trying to move up to higher performance. Intel has always pursued performance but is now working to offer low power versions of its microprocessors. Intel is an integrated device maker. ARM does not even sell chips – but licenses out its processor architecture and circuit designs to semiconductor partners.

To understand why the ARM architecture and culture is shaped the way it is and is different to processor trailblazer Intel, let’s go back to a time before the formation of ARM; to Cambridge, England in the mid-to-late 1970s, in the early days of EE Times.

Sophie Wilson is now engineering director and distinguished engineer at Broadcom but back in the 1970s Roger Wilson was a mathematics undergraduate with a strong interest in computing.

Wilson had joined the university’s computer and microprocessor societies, student-run interest groups that held regular meetings and, in the case of the microprocessor society, produced a magazine.

“One of the articles I contributed was on low power but it was not my only area of interest,” Wilson told EE Times.

However, Hermann Hauser, a Cambridge physics alumni, who was thinking what to do next in his career had the idea of creating an electronic pocket diary. Obviously, that would need to be battery operated and low power. He therefore asked around trying to find out who at the university might be able to design such a thing for him and Wilson remembers being approached after a university lecture by contacts of Hauser’s.

Wilson had memorized the RCA CMOS logic handbook of 1972 at a time when most ICs were not made using CMOS. Initially CMOS logic was slower than TTL. However, because the logic thresholds of CMOS were proportional to the power supply voltage, CMOS devices were well-adapted to battery-operated systems with simple power supplies, in which the voltage might vary. “CMOS was graduating from 15-volts to 5-volts,” recalls Wilson, which provided further power saving opportunities.

Snake game on an ARM microcontroller. Mike writes -

I just finished writing about my latest ARM project. I coded the classic game of Snake for an ARM Cortex-M0 controller using an old
cellphone screen.

Teensy 3.0 – 32 bit ARM Cortex-M4, usable in Arduino and C by Paul Stoffregen — @ Kickstarter.

Teensy 3.0 is a small, breadboard-friendly development board designed by Paul Stoffregen and PJRC.  Teensy 3.0 will bring a low-cost 32 bit ARM Cortex-M4 platform to hobbyists, students and engineers, using Arduino(R)** or programming directly in C language.

Based on a 32 bit ARM chip, Teensy 3.0 aims to greatly increase the computing capability and peripheral features, but maintain the same easy-to-use platform that has made Teensy 2.0 so successful.

Teensy 3.0 has been in development for well over 1 year.  Many prototypes have been built.  The photo above is the final prototype.

We backed it, nicely done Paul!

Above: the Kinetis L Microcontroller board from Freescale. The board features a Cortex-M0+ ARM processor, a suspiciously familiar minty-fresh board silhouette, and headers that remind me of summers in Ivrea. From EDA360:

There are two major reasons for reading this blog post:

1. A 32-bit microcontroller that sells for as little as $0.49 in 10K quantities and consumes 50µA/MHz
2. A $12.95 development board to be available late in September

These are two of the salient attributes of the Freescale Kinetis L microcontroller, previewed at Design West in San Jose back in March and now announced at the Freescale Technology Forum in San Antonia with alpha samples shipping. The target for this product is the vast sea of products and applications that currently incorporate 8- and 16-bit microcontrollers—mainly for reasons of legacy code, legacy familiarity, and cost. It will take a compelling product to hurdle these barriers and the low prices for the Kinetis L silicon and development board will help to jump those hurdles.

Late in September, eh? There’s a thing I go to every year in New York that happens in late September*…

Anyway, you can pre-order the board here. Please form a single-file line to the left. kthx!

More from EETimes on the ultra-low-power MCU:

Freescale Semiconductor Inc. is sampling the industry’s first microcontroller to use ARM’s ultra-low-power Cortex-M0+ processor, which aims to convert 8- and 16-bit applications to 32-bit status by offering one-third the energy consumption of 8-bit processors while delivering twice the performance of a 16-bit processor.

“The plus of our new Cortex M0+ is really a minus as far as power is concerned,” said Warren East, ARM’s chief executive officer. “We worked with Freescale to design a core that could extend the battery life of mobile applications the way an 8-bit microcontroller does, but while delivering the 32-bit performance people expect from ARM.”

Some interesting talk over at the AmpHour discussion thread as well.

*that they will be selling these at World Maker Faire is just hypothesis/wishful thinking on my part. But still… it would be totally rad.

I came across this presentation from Embedded World today that gives a brief summary of the various ARM Cortex chips (and there are a lot of them in the Cortex M, R and A families!), but specifically the ARM Cortex M series.  One of the biggest advantages of using ARM is that everything tends to be forward compatible, meaning that every instruction in the teeny-tiny Cortex-M0 core is supported in the larger Cortex-M3, and all the M3 instructions are included in the even larger M4 (which adds single-precision floating point acceleration, and some basic DSP-type commands), and so on.  If ARM has really taken off in recent years, this easy migration and transfer of knowledge is a big part of it, combined with the huge number of chips available from a half-dozen manufacturers (TI, NXP, Atmel, ST, Freescale, Energy Micro, etc., etc.).

I’m kind of curious how much interest there really is in low-end ARM chips though — essentially the Cortex M family, since the A-series is far more complicated to work with and isn’t aimed at solving the kinds of problems most hobbyists are working on.  I learned embedded development on ARM and it’s what I’ve always used, so I always have a hard time judging how accessible people find it, and what they’re looking to learn to get started with ARM.  I’m convinced the low-end ARM chips are the best value on the market right now — just look at the specs for dirt-cheap chips like the Cortex-M0 LPC1114 at $1 (50MHz, 32kB flash, 8kB SRAM) or the Cortex-M3 LPC1343 (72MHz, USB, faster code execution thanks to three pipeline architecture versus single-pipeline on the M0).

Let me know in the comments below what you’d like to see with ARM, or if you’d rather see things focused in a different direction (like focusing EE Bookshelf more on PCB and HW design, or general embedded SW development best-practices).  I’m all out of favorite datasheets and books, and wondering what people want to see more of moving forward!

It’s admittedly pretty specialized, but there’s very little accessible information out there about ARM assembly in general (documentation from ARM always feels  sadly neglected and half-hearted to me), but I came across this wonderfully precise and accessible summary of inline ARM assembly with GCC that really surprised me.  It’s not something you’ll use all the time even if you do a fair amount of development on ARM, but it’s a treasure chest of information if you’re trying to figure out how to optimize some particularly picky function: ARM GCC Inline Assembler Cookbook.

“If innovation was required, it would have to be created.”

I’m guessing the intended audience for this piece was prospective developers and enterprise clients, because it goes into far more technical detail than a mere consumer ad. It’s a neat snapshot of history with a good deal of information, and the music is just begging for a Glitch Mob remix.

[via @retrophile]

This made the rounds a month or so back, but NXP was kind enough to send me a handful of LPC1114 samples in the new DIP package to play with.  I’m already a pretty big fan of the QFP and QFN versions of this chip (LPC1114-based 802.15.4 Wireless Transceiver, etc.), and it also exists in a ridiculously small 2x2mm package, but DIP still holds a special place in my heart.  The new package is clearly targeting the Chinese market where a lot of low cost goods are still assembled by hand using PTH parts, but it’s a nice little bonus for the hobbiest community as well.  

While the smaller pin count necessitates a reduction in peripherals compared to the QFP48 chips, it still has the same internals as any other member of the LPC1114 family, and covers pretty much every peripheral or serial bus you’d expect to find in something aiming to be an 8-bit killer (coincidentally, DIP packaging may be the last nail in the coffin of 8-bit from a commercial point of view, now that you have such capable 32-bit offerings available for under $1, that beat 8-bit in almost every category from price, power, performance, etc.?)*:

• 50 MHz
• 32KB Flash
• 8KB SRAM
• SPI
• I2C
• USART
• 10-bit ADC
• 1×16-bit timer
• 2×32-bit timers

I’l update the LPC1114 Code Base to support this new package, and try to put together a simple parts list to do a breadboard circuit with this chip (how many other 32-bit ARM MCUs can you do that with, I ask?), but you can definately expect to see a bit more of this chip in the coming weeks as I try to find some hands-on time to play with it.  For the moment, I just wanted to post a quick photo to show that they’re indeed real, on my desk, and begging for a free afternoon to get them up and running, doing something fun.

In a related note, ARM announced the new Cortex M0+ today.  While actual silicon won’t be available from NXP until later this year, it’s a nice improvement on an already great little core.  The biggest advantage to me is single-cycle IO — the current M0 takes two cycles because of the Von Neumann architecture with a single channel for data and instructions, versus the three-channel Cortex M3 — though there are a number of other nice little updates.

* Obligatory warning: The opinions expressed in this caustic and inflammatory remark are purely those of the author, and not those of Adafruit Industries

Who are ARM’s top ten customers?. Peter writes…

The leading customer of processor technology licensor ARM Holdings plc (Cambridge, England) by revenue contribution in 2010, according to Nomura Equities Research, comes as a bit of a surprise. The financial brokerage and analysis house says it was Intel Corp (Santa Clara, CA).

What!!!

That was my reaction too and it begs the question: what ARM-supplied services, licenses or royalties was Intel paying millions of dollars for in 2010? ARM’s revenue in 2010 was $631.3 million so a 7 percent contribution means that about $44 million flowed from Intel to ARM—according to Nomura.

I am scratching my head to make sense of this. Could it be some hard disk drive controller that Intel makes by the bucket-load includes an ARM core? Or is there some ARM core that has made its way into some dusty, otherwise-forgotten corner of an Intel memory controller or image processing block that has ended up in an Intel microprocessor?

Intel 7.0%
TSMC 5.7%
Samsung 5.7%
TI 4.6%
NEC 3.5%
ST 3.5%
ZTE 2.8%
Broadcom 2.6%
AMD 2.5%
Infineon 2.4%
Apple 2.1%
Qualcomm 2.0%
Fujitsu 1.9%
UMC 1.9%
Lenovo 1.8%

Press release:

ARM today disclosed technical details of its new ARMv8 architecture, the first ARM architecture to include a 64-bit instruction set.  ARMv8 broadens the ARM architecture to embrace 64-bit processing and extends virtual addressing, building on the rich heritage of the 32-bit ARMv7 architecture upon which market leading cores such as the Cortex™-A9 and Cortex-A15 processors are built.

The ARM architecture is unique in its ability to span the full range of electronic devices and equipment, from tiny sensors through to large scale infrastructure equipment. Building on the industry standard 32-bit ARM architecture, the new ARMv8 architecture will expand the reach of ARM processor-based solutions into consumer and enterprise applications where extended virtual addressing and 64-bit data processing are required.

The ARMv8 architecture consists of two main execution states, AArch64 and AArch32. The AArch64 execution state introduces a new instruction set, A64 for 64-bit processing. The AArch32 state supports the existing ARM instruction set. The key features of the current ARMv7 architecture, including TrustZone®, virtualization and NEON™ advanced SIMD, are maintained or extended in the ARMv8 architecture.

“With our increasingly connected world, the market for 32-bit processing continues to expand and evolve creating new opportunities for 32-bit ARMv7 based processors in embedded, real-time and open application platforms.” said Mike Muller, CTO, ARM. “We believe the ARMv8 architecture is ideally suited to enable the ARM partnership to continue to grow in 32-bit application spaces and bring diverse, innovative and energy-efficient solutions to 64-bit processing markets.”

AWESOME!

Getting Started with the MCU – THE MUSIC VIDEO! This is for the lpc1768 which is the big daddy to our lpc1343. nxp makes great chips! We just got lpc1343 boards back in stock!

BACK IN STOCK – MicroBuilder LPC1343 (ARM Cortex M3) – v1.6. The LPC1343 is a low-power, 32-bit ARM Cortex-M3 microprocessor designed specifically for embedded devices. This is a fully assembled version of the LPC1343 Reference Design from talented Parisian designer, Microbuilder. No soldering required (female header pins are pre-soldered onto the board), this devboard is ready to go out of the box.

Please note that while there are some great introductory getting-started tutorials for this board, its best used by those with microcontroller experience. If you’ve played with AVR or PICs and are intrigued by the low cost and ultra fast 32-bit ARM Cortex M3 series, this is the dev board to get! If you’re just getting started with microcontrollers and electronics you should check out the Arduino which is very beginner-friendly.

In addition to publishing the schematics and layout files, MicroBuilder has written a full software library for the LPC1300 family. This allows you to quickly get started with all on-board peripherals, so you can focus on your own application functionality. The software library includes complete GCC-based startup code and details on setting up an ARM development environment using open source tools. Along with a standard Makefile, project files for the open-source CodeLite C/C++ IDE and the commercial GCC-based Crossworks for ARM are provided.

Within minutes, you’ll be using the USB interface for printf() debugging, reading from the analog inputs using analogRead(), tweaking pins without having to look up registers, etc. and best of all no ARM or JTAG programmer is required! The chip comes with a built in USB bootloader that appears as a very small disk drive. To reprogram, simply press the Bootload button and drag your new firmware file into the USB drive that appears. Then press Reset and your code is running. Is that cool or what?

Check it!

• Power the board via the 2.1mm DC jack (6-12V) or the mini-B USB connector (5V). There’s an onboard 3.3V regulator (LT1113)
• Debugging LED on pin 2.10 and SWD connectors for programming and debugging
• Open source toolchain (GPL) and software library (BSD)
• USB 2.0 HID and Mass Storage support built right into the ROM
• 32K of flash, 8K of SRAM…running at 72 MHz
• Built-into-ROM USB bootloader works with any computer and OS
• Full Speed USB, TTL UART, SPI and I2C interfaces
• Up to 42 General Purpose I/O (GPIO) pins with configurable pull-up/pull-down resistors
• 8 10-bit Analog-to-Digital Converter pins
• Four general purpose counter/timers with a total of four capture inputs and 13 match outputs
• Programmable WatchDog Timer (WDT)
• System tick timer for ez timekeeping
• LPC1343 datasheet has a lot of information about this chip

We don’t include a power supply, USB cable or proto-board…but we do toss in some bumpers.

In stock and shipping!

Android phone solves Rubik’s cube in 12.5 seconds…

A Lego Mindstorms robotics kit controlled by an HTC Nexus One smartphone successfully untangled a Rubik’s Cube puzzle in 12.5 seconds at this week’s ARM developer conference in Silicon Valley.

ARM principal engineer David Gilday, who masterminded the robotic Rubik’s Cube demo, told DeviceGuru that the 12.5-second run was the fastest result at the show, but that the average 3x3x3 Rubik’s Cube solution in the current setup had been running around 15 seconds.

ARM development gift guide – AN ADAFRUIT ELECTRONICS GIFT GUIDE.

The Beagle Board is a low-power, low-cost single-board computer produced by Texas Instruments in association with Digi-Key. The Beagle Board was designed with open source development in mind, and as a way of demonstrating the Texas Instrument’s OMAP3530 system-on-a-chip. The board was developed by a small team of TI engineers.

The LPC1343 is a low-power, 32-bit ARM Cortex-M3 microprocessor designed specifically for embedded devices. This is a fully assembled version of the LPC1343 Reference Design from talented Parisian designer, Microbuilder. No soldering required (female header pins are pre-soldered onto the board), this devboard is ready to go out of the box.

Please note that while there are some great introductory getting-started tutorials for this board, its best used by those with microcontroller experience. If you’ve played with AVR or PICs and are intrigued by the low cost and ultra fast 32-bit ARM Cortex M3 series, this is the dev board to get! If you’re just getting started with microcontrollers and electronics you should check out the Arduino which is very beginner-friendly.

In addition to publishing the schematics and layout files, MicroBuilder has written a full software library for the LPC1300 family. This allows you to quickly get started with all on-board peripherals, so you can focus on your own application functionality. The software library includes complete GCC-based startup code and details on setting up an ARM development environment using open source tools. Along with a standard Makefile, project files for the open-source CodeLite C/C++ IDE and the commercial GCC-based Crossworks for ARM are provided.

Within minutes, you’ll be using the USB interface for printf() debugging, reading from the analog inputs using analogRead(), tweaking pins without having to look up registers, etc. and best of all no ARM or JTAG programmer is required! The chip comes with a built in USB bootloader that appears as a very small disk drive. To reprogram, simply press the Bootload button and drag your new firmware file into the USB drive that appears. Then press Reset and your code is running. Is that cool or what?

Check it!

• Power the board via the 2.1mm DC jack (6-12V) or the mini-B USB connector (5V). There’s an onboard 3.3V regulator (LT1113)
• Debugging LED on pin 2.10 and SWD connectors for programming and debugging
• Open source toolchain (GPL) and software library (BSD)
• USB 2.0 HID and Mass Storage support built right into the ROM
• 32K of flash, 8K of SRAM…running at 72 MHz
• Built-into-ROM USB bootloader works with any computer and OS
• Full Speed USB, TTL UART, SPI and I2C interfaces
• Up to 42 General Purpose I/O (GPIO) pins with configurable pull-up/pull-down resistors
• 8 10-bit Analog-to-Digital Converter pins
• Four general purpose counter/timers with a total of four capture inputs and 13 match outputs
• Programmable WatchDog Timer (WDT)
• System tick timer for ez timekeeping
• LPC1343 datasheet has a lot of information about this chip

We don’t include a power supply, USB cable or proto-board…but we do toss in some bumpers.

Segger J-Link for ARM (EDU Edition)
This is the Swiss-Army Knife of HW debuggers for ARM, supporting the classic JTAG interface used by ARM7/ARM9 and more importantly the new-and-improved(TM) SWD interface native to all ARM Cortex chips (M0, M3, M4, etc.). If you are a non-commercial user or hobbiest, this is by and far the best deal out there for the most flexible ARM HW debuggers on the market. Supports on-the-go programming of supported ARM chips, step-through-debugging, etc., using all the major IDEs (Keil uVision, IAR, Crossworks for ARM [Windows-only], and also include GDB Server software that can be used on Windows for debugging with GCC and open-source ARM toolchains like Yagarto). At 49€ VAT included in Europe and $60 in North America it’s a no-brainer if your serious about working with ARM.

The Definitive Guide to the ARM Cortex-M3 (2nd Edition)
The go-to book for anyone seriously interested in using one of the many new Cortex M3-based chips that are popping up everywhere. The book is accessible, and also includes a lot of examples aimed at open-source GCC-based toolchains for ARM. Be sure to get the second edition since it has a number of important updates and includes information on the Cortex-M0 (low-cost, low-power) as well.

Chumby Hacker Board
While actually programming the 454MHz ARM9-based iMX.233 processor directly in C gets messy pretty quick, the Chumby Hacker Boards takes all the really dreary work off your hands and lets you start developing in the relative comfort of Linux without too much work on your part (other than the inevitable Linux learning curve if you’re new to it). At $90 it’s also a pretty amazing deal (especially compared to the price of the official iMX.233 development board from Freescale!). This is definitely approaching the deep-end of the pool for ARM, but it’s probably a bit more accessible than something like a BeagleBoard. Cheers to Chumby Industries and Bunnie for making this great little board possible and at such a reasonable price.

C Programming Language (Kernighan and Ritchie)
If you’re going to be doing anything with ARM, it will probably be in C (or maybe C++ on the high-end), and the original book is probably still the most accessible. Amidst the thousands of IT and programming books published every years, this one stand out for it’s clarity and emminent readability. If you’re just getting started with C, or need a bit of brushing up, this is probably the best investment you can make both in terms of time and money. (If you just want a quick refresher, O’Reilly’s “C Pocket Reference” is very handy as well in an easy to transport size.

BACK IN STOCK – MicroBuilder LPC1343 (ARM Cortex M3) – v1.6. The LPC1343 is a low-power, 32-bit ARM Cortex-M3 microprocessor designed specifically for embedded devices. This is a fully assembled version of the LPC1343 Reference Design from talented Parisian designer, Microbuilder. No soldering required (female header pins are pre-soldered onto the board), this devboard is ready to go out of the box.

Please note that while there are some great introductory getting-started tutorials for this board, its best used by those with microcontroller experience. If you’ve played with AVR or PICs and are intrigued by the low cost and ultra fast 32-bit ARM Cortex M3 series, this is the dev board to get! If you’re just getting started with microcontrollers and electronics you should check out the Arduino which is very beginner-friendly.

In addition to publishing the schematics and layout files, MicroBuilder has written a full software library for the LPC1300 family. This allows you to quickly get started with all on-board peripherals, so you can focus on your own application functionality. The software library includes complete GCC-based startup code and details on setting up an ARM development environment using open source tools. Along with a standard Makefile, project files for the open-source CodeLite C/C++ IDE and the commercial GCC-based Crossworks for ARM are provided.

Within minutes, you’ll be using the USB interface for printf() debugging, reading from the analog inputs using analogRead(), tweaking pins without having to look up registers, etc. and best of all no ARM or JTAG programmer is required! The chip comes with a built in USB bootloader that appears as a very small disk drive. To reprogram, simply press the Bootload button and drag your new firmware file into the USB drive that appears. Then press Reset and your code is running. Is that cool or what?

Check it!

• Power the board via the 2.1mm DC jack (6-12V) or the mini-B USB connector (5V). There’s an onboard 3.3V regulator (LT1113)
• Debugging LED on pin 2.10 and SWD connectors for programming and debugging
• Open source toolchain (GPL) and software library (BSD)
• USB 2.0 HID and Mass Storage support built right into the ROM
• 32K of flash, 8K of SRAM…running at 72 MHz
• Built-into-ROM USB bootloader works with any computer and OS
• Full Speed USB, TTL UART, SPI and I2C interfaces
• Up to 42 General Purpose I/O (GPIO) pins with configurable pull-up/pull-down resistors
• 8 10-bit Analog-to-Digital Converter pins
• Four general purpose counter/timers with a total of four capture inputs and 13 match outputs
• Programmable WatchDog Timer (WDT)
• System tick timer for ez timekeeping
• LPC1343 datasheet has a lot of information about this chip

We don’t include a power supply, USB cable or proto-board…but we do toss in some bumpers.

In stock and shipping!

“awesome rossum” is always pushing the boundaries of size and complexity. Since discovering the cortex M3 series he’s been on a serious tear with a bit-banged color NTSC demo that looks like about 1 square cm. 32 bits @ 72 mhz is the bomb! If you want to check out this series of chips, pick up one of our exceptionally well-designed Microbuilder.eu lpc1343 devboards and start on the tutorials.

At some point in the future, many more everyday objects will have tiny embedded chips that can communicate with networks. But just as we’re debating net neutrality and the value of the open web vs closed client applications, we will have to decide who will control the internet of things, too.

…Free and open-source vs. ready-for-anyone-to-use out-of-the-box: we’ve been down this road many times before. I doubt this argument will have a clear winner and loser, but it’s important that it’s clearly framed and articulated now, before any one approach gets locked-in as the default option.

You Too Can Join the Internet Of Things @ NYTimes.com… Another ARM article in the NYT, 2 days in a row – this one leaves out one big detail though…

Called mbed, the research effort puts a kit for a microcontroller – sort of a basic, low-power computer on a chip – in the hands of engineers and hobbyists for about $59. Then, ARM provides a set of software tools for bringing that microcontroller to life and linking it with other interesting items like accelerometers, gyroscopes, cameras, displays and thermometers.

Simon Ford, the ARM researcher leading mbed, said that the package of hardware and software he had created should open microcontrollers up to a new audience by removing some of the technical headaches associated with programming the chips.

The mbed device can plug straight into a U.S.B. port on a computer, appearing as a flash drive to the PC. People can then create programs or download existing modules from the mbed Web site and get off and running in a matter of minutes.

mbed requires an online compiler, so that you are dependent on them forever. You cannot do anything without using their online site. We would like to see mbed change this policy, release some open source hardware, allow OSS toolchains, etc— (they like Arduino shields, why not join in the community? It could be awesome!)

We like the hardware in the mbed, the cortex series is great (it’s why we carry an ARM Cortex M3 board now) – but the ARM complier used with mbed costs about $5,000 so maybe it will never be anywhere but online. This is why we really like the ARM dev board we carry, it’s OSHW, the firmware libraries are all BSD licensed, you can use an OSS tool chain and like the mbed you can drag and drop a compiled program. We’re also considering carrying a lpc1768 version of the board (let us know if you’d like that!)

mbed will be at the Open Source Hardware summit & Maker Faire, we’ll see if they’re up for this – post your comments / suggestions in the comments and we’ll pass them along as well.

Update: Great comments brewing! Jump in!!

William writes:

I really like the mBed, on spec. I will never use it because of their online policy. It’s great for ease, but bad for someone who doesn’t have internet access all the time. What if I need to debug onsite and I’m out in the field? At any rate, if you carry a board with the lpc1768, that would be great. I like the peripherals, USB, Ethernet, SPI, I2C, all in one tidy little package. I also like the mBed form factor as it’s easily bread boarded.

Chris writes:

I considered the mbed but discounted it for the very reasons you point out here. Its a cool little device but the thought of being dependent on a tool chain that I don’t ‘own’ was crazy to me. If they ever open the system or come up with a way of doing builds with an open tool chain I will consider it, but for now it really doesn’t matter. Between the Arduino and the LPC1343 board here at Adafruit (and the LeafLabs Maple I also have) I don’t ‘need’ to use something like the mbed.

ARM Chips May Spread Into Everyday Items @ NYTimes.com via .

ARM, which designs the low-power chips that go into just about every cellphone sold today, commands a prime position when it comes to one of the next major technological revolutions. This is the so-called Internet of Things, when all sorts of everyday objects will have tiny chips placed inside them and gain the ability to process information and talk to the Web…

Dealing with hand-held devices and cellphones forced ARM to operate under severe power restrictions. It chased milliwatts, while Intel chased horsepower.
ARM’s low-power chips are echoed in its laidback culture. Mr. Muller recalled an early meeting in a Cambridge pub where the company’s first employees plotted ARM’s future. The engineers were asked to raise their hands if they wanted to become executives.

“Who cares about the PC?” Mr. Flautner said. “I would love to lose mine. Now, it’s all about penetrating these weird markets that we can’t even fully fathom yet.”

Check our new ARM development section!

NEW PRODUCT – MicroBuilder LPC1343 (ARM Cortex M3) – The LPC1343 is a low-power, 32-bit ARM Cortex-M3 microprocessor designed specifically for embedded devices. This is a fully assembled version of the LPC1343 Reference Design from talented Parisian designer, Microbuilder. No soldering required (female header pins are pre-soldered onto the board), this devboard is ready to go out of the box.

Please note that while there are some great introductory getting-started tutorials for this board, its best used by those with microcontroller experience. If you’ve played with AVR or PICs and are intrigued by the low cost and ultra fast 32-bit ARM Cortex M3 series, this is the dev board to get! If you’re just getting started with microcontrollers and electronics you should check out the Arduino which is very beginner-friendly!

In addition to publishing the schematics and layout files, MicroBuilder has written a full software library for the LPC1300 family. This allows you to quickly get started with all on-board peripherals, so you can focus on your own application functionality. The software library includes complete GCC-based startup code and details on setting up an ARM development environment using open source tools. Along with a standard Makefile, project files for the open-source CodeLite C/C++ IDE and the commercial GCC-based Crossworks for ARM are provided.

Within minutes, you’ll be using the USB interface for printf() debugging, reading from the analog inputs using analogRead(), tweaking pins without having to look up registers, etc. and best of all no ARM or JTAG programmer is required! The chip comes with a built in USB bootloader that appears as a very small disk drive. To reprogram, simply press the Bootload button and drag your new firmware file into the USB drive that appears. Then press Reset and your code is running. Is that cool or what?

Check it!

• Power the board via the 2.1mm DC jack (6-12V) or the mini-B USB connector (5V). There’s an onboard 3.3V regulator (LT1113)
• Debugging LED on pin 2.10 and SWD connectors for programming and debugging
• Open source toolchain (GPL) and software library (BSD)
• USB 2.0 HID and Mass Storage support built right into the ROM
• 32K of flash, 8K of SRAM…running at 72 MHz
• Built-into-ROM USB bootloader works with any computer and OS
• Full Speed USB, TTL UART, SPI and I2C interfaces
• Up to 42 General Purpose I/O (GPIO) pins with configurable pull-up/pull-down resistors
• 8 10-bit Analog-to-Digital Converter pins
• Four general purpose counter/timers with a total of four capture inputs and 13 match outputs
• Programmable WatchDog Timer (WDT)
• System tick timer for ez timekeeping
• LPC1343 datasheet has a lot of information about this chip

We don’t include a power supply, USB cable or proto-board…but we do toss in some bumpers.

In stock and shipping now!

NEW PRODUCT – MicroBuilder LPC1343 proto board – v1. Snap on your own circuit with this matching proto PCB for the LPC1343 devboard. There’s space for thru-hole as well as some SMT components. Comes with some standard 0.1″ male header for soldering in, you’ll have to do that yourself but its quite easy.

In stock and shipping now!