ADI mixes multicore DSP and ARM cores for audio, industrial designs
The eight chips contain varying amounts of DSP capability together with an ARM Cortex-A5 core, which is tightly integrated into the architecture. The intention, and ADI spokesman commented is to meet the needs of application where advanced DSP is a part of the overall task. This series of devices is intended to meet growing real-time processing demands, and to support transitions from fixed- to floating-point operation all within a power budget such that devices will be thermally stable with package-cooling alone – that is, no fans and limited or no heatsinking – and at 105C. Accordingly, ADI builds the chips in a CMOS process optimised for low leakage, and for limited rise of leakage current (and hence power) as temperatures reach their upper specified limits.
The eight SHARC processors deliver peak performance greater than 24 giga-floating-point operations per second using two enhanced SHARC+ cores and advanced DSP accelerators (FFT, FIR, IIR). The ADSP-SC58x and ADSP-2158x series consume less than 2W at high temperature, making the new processor line-up more than five times more power efficient than previous SHARC products and a claimed twice as power-efficient as competitive processors. Their DSP power can be used where thermal management sets the limit for power consumption, or where the higher costs and lower reliability of fans cannot be tolerated; automotive, consumer and professional audio, multi-axis motor control, and energy distribution systems. The 24 Gflops comes with 5.4 Gflops directly from the DSP cores, and the balance from the various accelerators, especially the FFT/iFFT block. Other attributes that ADI calls attention to include the twin DDR ports; and the amoount of on-chip – especially L1 cache – memory.
The added ARM Cortex-A5 processor, with FPU and Neon DSP extensions can handle additional real-time processing tasks and manage peripherals used to interface to time-critical data in audio, industrial closed-loop control, and industrial sensing applications. These interfaces include, ADI proposes, Gigabit Ethernet (with AVB and IEEE-1588 support), USB High-Speed, mobile storage (including SD/SDIO), PCI Express and a rich variety of other connectivity options for a flexible and simplified system design. ARM TrustZone security and an onboard crypto hardware accelerators are included. For applications where reliability is a critical requirement, memory parity and error-correction hardware provide higher data integrity.
The ADSP-2158x family, without the ARM Cortex-A5 core, is designed for applications where a DSP co-processor is typically needed and includes the two SHARC+ cores and DSP accelerators with a peripheral set matched to the cores. Parts with the ‘SC’ (SHARC connected) designation indicate the presence of the ARM core, which has access to multiple data paths and can access the same shared memory as the DSP cores, with the ability for processors to execute mutual interrupts, allowing flexibility in partitioning signal processing and real-time tasks.
The ADSP-SC58x/2158x is supported by ADI’s CrossCore Embedded Studio development tool suite, providing design engineers with interactive, real-time development tools. www.analog.com/cces
ADI and Micrium have collaborated to offer µC/OS-II and µC/OS-III real-time kernels on both SHARC+ and ARM Cortex-A5 cores, as well as Micrium’s USB Host, USB Device and file system stacks running on the ARM Cortex-A5. Analog Devices also provides a Linux Add-In for CrossCore Embedded Studio, enabling customers interested in taking advantage of the communication stacks and application packages available for embedded Linux, running on the ARM Cortex-A5 core. ADSP-SC58x EZ-KIT-Lite development boards and ICE-1000/2000 emulators facilitate the creation, test, and debug of advanced applications.
Product samples are available along with the full set of development tools. Options include one or two SHARC+ cores, with or without the ARM Cortex-A5 core, various peripheral configurations, and two 19 × 19-mm BGA package alternatives. Pricing for these products starts at $17.00 each for 10,000-unit production quantities. For a limited time, the ADSP-SC589 EZ-KIT-Lite with an ICE-1000 emulator and CrossCore Embedded Studio license is available for the special product announcement price of $495.
Analog Devices; www.analog.com
A video is at; https://analog.com/ADSP-SC58xVideo
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