Super Low Power MCU from Renesas offers large flash in a small package

The new device incorporates a high-performance H8/300H CPU core, offering extremely low power consumption and the flexibility of on-chip flash memory. The combination of this low power consumption with very low cost and an advanced feature set makes the device ideal for many battery- and line-powered applications, as well as intelligent sensor applications.

The H8/38606F offers a fast oscillator start up feature, where the main oscillator can start up in around 20 us using an external resonator. This makes it ideal for any application which spends most of its time asleep in the lowest power modes, and then wakes to take readings or to communicate.

The asynchronous timer on the H8/38606F also makes the device ideal for many battery powered applications which count pulses and keep time, being able to count external pulses and use its internal real time clock to achieve an average power consumption of around 0.5 uA. Combined with an on-chip high-resolution 10-bit A/D converter with a wide sampling range, this makes the H8/38606F perfect for applications such as water and flow meters.

Intelligent sensors are often required to communicate while still minimising power consumption. The H8/38606F Tiny SLP supports many methods of low power communications, including a USART with built-in IrDA interface that can be driven at up to 2400 baud from a 32 kHz oscillator. A specially-designed 16-bit timer along with the two on-board analogue comparators also provide solutions for a variety of commonly used power and data over two wire communications schemes. This powerful timer module can also be used for a number of other purposes, including driving a variety of motors, and is capable of generating up to 4 channels of PWM output. These features make the H8/38606F ideal for many sensor applications, such as fire and smoke detectors, and PIRs.

An on-chip watchdog timer with built-in oscillator, along with power on reset and the on-chip oscillator also makes the H/38606F easy to design with in systems where reliability is an issue. The H8/38606F is supported by Renesas' High Performance Embedded Workbench and the E8a low cost on-chip debugger, providing all the tools required to evaluate and develop applications with the device. The H8/38606F is available now in a 5 x 6 mm2 QFN package.