STMicroelectronics - New Applications for its 32-bit MCU STM32 Connectivity Line

STMicroelectronics will showcase “Internet radio” and “Standby MCU” demonstrations with evaluation boards that use its STM32 Connectivity Line of ARM Cortex-M3 core-based 32-bit MCUs at its booth at Embedded Technology 2009. The exhibition will be held at PACIFICO YOKOHAMA, Japan, from Wednesday, November 18, to Friday, November 20, 2009. Both demonstrations run on an operating system (OS) from eForce Co., Ltd., a developer and manufacturer of embedded software, using applications from ZIPS Corporation, a vendor of middleware (TCP/IP) and firmware.

With the Internet radio demonstration, visitors to the booth will be able to listen to actual Internet radio transmissions on the LAN-connected STM32F107 evaluation board. A liquid crystal display implemented on the board also enables the listener to check out information on the transmissions currently playing. Usually devices such as PCs or high-performance mobile devices are used for listening to Internet radio, but in this demonstration ST uses just the STM32F107 with its built-in memory to carry out high-speed streaming, proving the sophisticated capability of its product. This demonstration can be applied for applications such as AV amplifiers, digital photo frames and digital TV, as well as for optional functions on items such as toys.

Furthermore, in the standby MCU demonstration, using the STM32F107 mounted as a slave-MCU on to the periphery of the main system-on-chip (SoC), ST shows how to implement high-performance Ethernet functionality on low-power consumption, at just 10mW or less (when standby mode). In this demonstration, the LAN-connected PC ‘master’ controls the slave-MCU operation mode while illustrating energy consumption rates in real-time. In addition, this demonstration, which targets applications such as printers and projectors connected to Ethernet, shows that the STM32F107 can run not only as a slave-MCU but also as a master MCU.

Both demonstrations use eForce’s Real Time Operation System (RTOS) uC3 and TCP/IP uNET3 middleware, and the application software developed by ZIPS Corporation. The leading embedded technology of both these companies enables software to be implemented in limited-capacity built-in ROM/RAM enabling a compact embedded system.