IAR Systems Innovative Power Debugging Technology is Available for Renesas Electronics' RX Microcontroller Architecture

IAR Embedded Workbench correlates system power consumption to trace data and the source code, making it possible to analyze how software can be designed to conserve power and discover any power glitches.



We designed the RX core to be best-in-class when it comes to performance, code and data density, and power consumption, said Ritesh Tyagi, director of product marketing, Consumer & Industrial Business Unit, Renesas Electronics America. Traditional software development tools only address utilization of the first two design targets, but with the innovative power debugging technology from IAR Systems, embedded developers also can now stay in control of power consumption.



As the company supporting the highest number and widest range of Renesas Electronics microcontrollers in the industry, it is important for us to make our new innovations available for Renesas Electronics customers, said Fredrik Medin, Marketing Director, IAR Systems. The modern RX core complements our power debugging technology. The advanced low-power features of the RX devices can be utilized better when the software development process incorporates power debugging to provide insight into how the application influences power consumption.



Power measurements can be visualized in various ways in IAR Embedded Workbench. Simultaneous display of power samples, call stack, interrupt activity and variable values on the same timeline maps key events in the execution against power consumption. Further analysis can be made using the power profiling utility that measures power consumption during the execution of specific functions under specified time intervals. The power profiling utility provides insight to where efforts should be done to optimize for lower power consumption. Detailed information about power samples is provided through a live power log.



Power debugging is enabled by an IAR J-Link Ultra emulator probe that provides the hardware connection and power sampling. A standard IAR J-Link can be used for evaluation of the power debugging technology, but with lower sample rate and resolution.



IAR Embedded Workbench for the Renesas Electronics RX MCU architecture will be available from mid-December 2010.