07 October 2008

TI Floating-Point-DSP-Plus-ARM Applications Processor

Texas Instruments (TI) has released the OMAP-L137 floating-point-DSP-plus-ARM applications processor that it said transcends traditional floating-point processors, allowing engineers the flexibility to design both basic and advanced product lines.

The device, based on TI's C674x DSP core, merge the inherent advantages of floating point with a combination of connectivity peripherals, low power and low cost that, until now, has only been available with fixed-point devices.

"For applications like audio and medical, the high precision and wide dynamic range provided by floating point have always been paramount because end users demand fidelity and data accuracy," said Corey Chao, low power processors marketing manager, TI. "In recent years, consumers have also begun to require more portability and connectivity. In response to that demand, developers have asked TI for new low-power, floating-point processors with a wealth of integrated peripherals, so that is exactly what we are providing."

The OMAP-L137 applications processor includes USB 2.0/1.1, 10/100 Ethernet and multimedia card/secure digital (MMC/SD) peripherals to ensure that developers can easily add connectivity options to their designs. Traditionally, these peripherals have only been available on fixed-point devices or via separate components but are needed for a broad range of applications that require connectivity for high data transfer or networking/Internet access, TI said.

The OMAP-L137 applications processor includes the C674x floating-point DSP core plus an ARM9, providing up to 300 MHz per core. With the on-chip ARM9, developers can leverage the floating-point DSP for real-time, processing-intensive computations while off-loading non-real-time tasks to the ARM. This functionality enables developers to design more feature-rich end products that include graphical user interfaces (GUIs), touch screens and/or networking stacks, TI said. Additionally, developers can use the ARM to
implement various high-level operating systems such as VxWorks, WinCE or Linux. The OMAP-L137 is also pin-to-pin compatible with the C6747 DSP, allowing customers to simultaneously develop multiple products with varying feature levels using the different processor options.

The OMAP-L137 applications processor also operates at significantly low power levels, using 62mW in standby and 490 mW total active power, TI said.