Atmel and i-Novi to Deliver 3DA TouchSensing Intuitive Wireless Lighting Control

This reference design is based on Atmel's QTouch Library supported RF single-chip, ATmega128RFA1, featuring both a high-performance Atmel AVR® microcontroller and Atmel's best-in-class 2.4 GHz RF transceiver in a single chip. Combining QMatrix®, the most reliable capacitive sensing method used in a number of lighting products for user interface and control functions, and R4Control, Atmel's ZigBee® RF4CE compliant software platform, the ATmega128RFA1 is perfect for touch-based RF remote controls including lighting control, remote control, iPOD® docking interface, and control panels keypads. The 3DA expands user interface experiences even further by adding a complementary control mechanism. i-Novi is an experienced team with a proven track record of delivering innovative products to the consumer, domotics and lighting market.

Atmel's ATmega128RFA1 is the Industry's first wireless and touch single-chip microcontroller. The embedded radio interface offers a unique hardware feature set to boost the overall system performance and to support a great variety of IEEE 802.15.4 compliant applications. The radio link reliability is also improved when using the antenna diversity feature, which automatically selects the best signal from two antennas for each incoming frame. The device supports the control of external power amplifiers for range extension. High-data rate modes of up to 2 Mbit/s are available to address the general purpose 2.4 GHz ISM applications.

The combination of a low-power and single-chip design enables designers to implement a new generation of battery driven systems, smaller board space and a lower overall system bill of material (BOM). This makes the ATmega128RFA1 the most efficient wireless touch microcontroller in the market.

System development is supported by Atmel's free software stacks, libraries and hardware evaluation and development kits. Atmel's AVR ATmega128RFA1 microcontroller offers the performance while running the free QTouch® library for embedding capacitive touch buttons, sliders and wheels functionality. i-Novi has used the excellent QMatrix® technology which delivers unequalled precision for touch operations, superb low power characteristics and leading signal-to-noise ratios. Atmel's QMatrix detects touch using a scanned passive matrix of electrode sets. A single ATmega128RFA1 device can drive up to 64 keys, offering a very low cost-per-key wireless control product to be achieved.