Cypress Releases New Components for PSoC Creator 2.2 IDE

The Component Pack 6 update includes four new PSoC Components—pre-verified “virtual chips” represented by an icon—that users can drag-and-drop into a design and configure to suit a broad array of application requirements. Leveraging PSoC's hardware programmability, the update delivers new peripheral functions to existing PSoC devices, speeding time-to-market while adding differentiation to end-products.

Component Pack 6 adds the following new capabilities for PSoC customers:
• Software Transmit UART: Provides a simple transmit Universal Asynchronous Receiver/Transmitter that does not consume hardware digital resources.
• Emulated EEPROM: Simplifies access to non-volatile memory, preserving data without having to add dedicated Electrically Erasable Programmable Read-Only Memory to a product’s bill of materials.
• Segment/Matrix LED Driver: Enables fast prototyping of displays.
• SC/CT Comparator: Enables Switched-Capacitor/Continuous-Time hardware blocks to be used as comparators.

“Component Pack 6 is another example of how Cypress is continually adding new functionality to PSoC,” said John Weil, Senior Director of PSoC Marketing and Applications for Cypress. “We take customer feedback into consideration in planning our new PSoC Components, with the goal of empowering those same customers to design truly differentiated products that they can quickly bring to market.”

PSoC Creator is more than merely an IDE. In addition to a robust compiler and programmer, it allows users to configure PSoC programmable hardware into a custom one-chip solution. It includes a rich library of over 100 pre-verified, production-ready analog and digital PSoC Components.

About PSoC Creator
PSoC Creator is a unique design software that enables engineers to design the way they think, using schematic-based design capture along with pre-verified, production-ready Components to keep system creation independent of the target PSoC device. Instead of trawling through device documentation and memorizing register maps, users simply lay out the design, just as they would on paper or a whiteboard, and let the tool translate it into the PSoC configuration. With PSoC Creator, customers create designs according to application requirements, not the limitations of the target device. Re-targeting to new devices is as simple as rebuilding an application, so porting designs between PSoC devices becomes a snap, including migrating working designs seamlessly from 8- to 32-bit devices.

PSoC Creator automatically places Components into the selected PSoC device, routes all on-chip signals and directs I/O to the optimal pins. Each peripheral component is carefully parameterized so that the implementation is automatically optimized to fit the developer’s needs perfectly with no wasted resources. The build process generates a consistently-named set of regression-tested APIs for each component that allows the software developer to control the hardware without knowing the underlying register set. Customized designs, and their associated APIs, can be saved in a library for future reuse and easily shared within an organization.

MCUs Can’t. PSoC Can.
PSoC devices employ a highly configurable system-on-chip architecture for embedded control design, offering a flash-based equivalent of a field-programmable ASIC without lead-time or NRE penalties. PSoC devices integrate configurable analog and digital circuits, controlled by an on-chip microcontroller, providing both enhanced design revision capability and component count savings. A single PSoC device can integrate as many as 100 peripheral functions saving customers design time, board space and power consumption while improving system quality and reducing system cost.

The flexible PSoC resources allow designers to future-proof their products by enabling firmware-based changes during design, validation, production, and even in the field. The unique PSoC flexibility shortens design cycle time and allows for late-breaking feature enhancements. All PSoC devices are also dynamically reconfigurable, enabling designers to morph internal resources on-the-fly, utilizing fewer components to perform a given task.