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Entry level ‘plug and play’ intelligent display platforms from Anders Electronics

12th November 2008

ES Admin

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Anders Electronics has announced that it is adding two new low-cost, entry-level product series to its UMR (User Machine Relationship) range of intelligent colour display platforms. The new low-cost platforms will allow designers and system integrators to quickly and cost-effectively enhance the usability of their devices by migrating legacy products to full colour interfaces, whilst also adding functionality not usually supported by their existing systems.

The Anders UMR platforms bring products to life through a ‘plug and play’ intelligent colour display interface, with optional GUI development tools and run time engine. This allows enhancement of next generation user experiences more commonly found in cutting edge consumer devices – and enables development teams to focus resources on their core application expertise.

Anders’ UMR intelligent displays consist of small sized colour TFT displays with touch screen, pre-integrated with a multi-functional, configurable embedded system with ready to run operating system, optimised to drive the display and run a graphical user interface (GUI).

Based on a 200MHz ARM processor, the new UMR 3 series is a low-cost platform designed for medium volume applications requiring limited animation capabilities. For higher volume applications the UMR 1 series offers a very low-cost platform based around a 50MHz ARM processor, supporting bitmap graphics and configurable to specific applications.

Both of the new platforms are supplied with a debugged embedded operating system with all required drivers and are available with pre-integrated options of a 2.8-inch, 3.5-inch and 5.7-inch QVGA displays or a 4.3-inch WQVGA TFT.

Because the new platforms provide a complete end-to-end user interface solution they eliminate the need for designers and integrators to create a discrete design, and help overcome the challenges of selecting and interfacing a TFT display, and adding new embedded functionality such as an Ethernet or SD card. As a result, they significantly reduce the time and cost taken to move from initial concept to manufactured product.

The two prototypes on display in Munich demonstrate a 2.8-inch QVGA display with the UMR-1 feature set, and a 4.3-inch WQVGA display for the UMR-3 platform.

The UMR 1 and UMR 3 series are scheduled to be fully available in Q2/2009 and will be offered with a complementary Anders UMR Interface Development Suite. They join Anders’ existing UMR-5 series, which also reduce the development cost and time-to-market for user interfaces demanding multimedia capabilities.