Hi, During the latest months I have been receiving offers for 32-bit MCU's, mos= tly based on ARM-Cortex CPU's, at prices I'm currently paying for 8-bit dev= ices, or even cheaper! This has brought me to benchmark them with the MCU i= ndependent part of my C++ code and surprisingly the results are quite simil= ar. Same price, same flash consumption ... what do yo think? Is this the end of= the 8-bit's? I guess it is. Regards, Toni.
Do you see any future to the 8-bit MCU's?
Started by ●July 21, 2011
Reply by ●July 21, 20112011-07-21
On Thu, 21 Jul 2011 08:30:54 -0700 (PDT), Antoni Lacasta i Sull� <antoni.lacasta@googlemail.com> wrote:>Hi, > >During the latest months I have been receiving offers for 32-bit MCU's, mostly based on ARM-Cortex CPU's, at prices I'm currently paying for 8-bit devices, or even cheaper! This has brought me to benchmark them with the MCU independent part of my C++ code and surprisingly the results are quite similar.Do you mean that the code size is similar, but runs at a faster speed? Otherwise, what is the advantage? The 32 bit devices tend to have more associated complexity such as requiring a seperate core voltage from the I/O voltage.>Same price, same flash consumption ... what do yo think? Is this the end of the 8-bit's? I guess it is.They will continue to be squeezed, but I doubt they'll go away for another decade or more, particularly in applications that don't need much memory and have few I/O (ie. where the core size represents more of the chip)>Regards, >Toni.
Reply by ●July 21, 20112011-07-21
On 21.7.11 6:30 , Antoni Lacasta i Sull� wrote:> Hi, > > During the latest months I have been receiving offers for 32-bit MCU's, mostly based on ARM-Cortex CPU's, at prices I'm currently paying for 8-bit devices, or even cheaper! This has brought me to benchmark them with the MCU independent part of my C++ code and surprisingly the results are quite similar. > > Same price, same flash consumption ... what do yo think? Is this the end of the 8-bit's? I guess it is. > > Regards, > Toni.I just redesigned an old card using a 8051, an A/D converter, a static RAM (2 kilobytes) and some glue logic. The new card was done with a Stellaris Cortex, LM3S818. All the IC:s on the new card costed together less than the A/D converter chip on the old design. When our current AVR -based designs need to be replaced, the Stellaris chips are the potential replacements. The Stellaris chips run fast with minimal electricity, but there is the price of a quite complicated set-up of the master and peripheral clocks and port pins. -- Tauno Voipio tauno voipio (at) iki fi
Reply by ●July 21, 20112011-07-21
On Jul 21, 9:46=A0am, Tauno Voipio <tauno.voi...@notused.fi.invalid> wrote:> On 21.7.11 6:30 , Antoni Lacasta i Sull=E0 wrote: > > > Hi, > > > During the latest months I have been receiving offers for 32-bit MCU's,=mostly based on ARM-Cortex CPU's, at prices I'm currently paying for 8-bit= devices, or even cheaper! This has brought me to benchmark them with the M= CU independent part of my C++ code and surprisingly the results are quite s= imilar.> > > Same price, same flash consumption ... what do yo think? Is this the en=d of the 8-bit's? I guess it is.> > > Regards, > > Toni. > > I just redesigned an old card using a 8051, an A/D converter, > a static RAM (2 kilobytes) and some glue logic. The new card > was done with a Stellaris Cortex, LM3S818. All the IC:s on > the new card costed together less than the A/D converter > chip on the old design. > > When our current AVR -based designs need to be replaced, the > Stellaris chips are the potential replacements. > > The Stellaris chips run fast with minimal electricity, > but there is the price of a quite complicated set-up of > the master and peripheral clocks and port pins.Except for the price of the tools. AVR and PIC tools are still much cheaper. We expect to spend around $1k for the new tools; unfortunately, the cheap/low cost version won't cut it.
Reply by ●July 21, 20112011-07-21
On Thu, 21 Jul 2011 11:06:23 -0700, linnix wrote:> On Jul 21, 9:46 am, Tauno Voipio <tauno.voi...@notused.fi.invalid> > wrote: >> On 21.7.11 6:30 , Antoni Lacasta i Sullà wrote: >> >> > Hi, >> >> > During the latest months I have been receiving offers for 32-bit >> > MCU's, mostly based on ARM-Cortex CPU's, at prices I'm currently >> > paying for 8-bit devices, or even cheaper! This has brought me to >> > benchmark them with the MCU independent part of my C++ code and >> > surprisingly the results are quite similar. >> >> > Same price, same flash consumption ... what do yo think? Is this the >> > end of the 8-bit's? I guess it is. >> >> > Regards, >> > Toni. >> >> I just redesigned an old card using a 8051, an A/D converter, a static >> RAM (2 kilobytes) and some glue logic. The new card was done with a >> Stellaris Cortex, LM3S818. All the IC:s on the new card costed together >> less than the A/D converter chip on the old design. >> >> When our current AVR -based designs need to be replaced, the Stellaris >> chips are the potential replacements. >> >> The Stellaris chips run fast with minimal electricity, but there is the >> price of a quite complicated set-up of the master and peripheral clocks >> and port pins. > > Except for the price of the tools. AVR and PIC tools are still much > cheaper. We expect to spend around $1k for the new tools; > unfortunately, the cheap/low cost version won't cut it.I'm using the gnu-arm tool chain, built from source*. It works fine. How much does CodeSourcery want for the 'real' tools? * I'm not saying it was _free_, but I built the tool chain when I was between contracts, so it was relatively cheap. -- www.wescottdesign.com
Reply by ●July 21, 20112011-07-21
On 07/21/2011 08:14 PM, Tim Wescott wrote:> I'm using the gnu-arm tool chain, built from source*. It works fine. > > How much does CodeSourcery want for the 'real' tools? > > * I'm not saying it was _free_, but I built the tool chain when I was > between contracts, so it was relatively cheap.For my last project, I downloaded the free CodeSourcery Lite binary toolchain. It works fine, and only took a few minutes to download/install.
Reply by ●July 21, 20112011-07-21
On Thu, 21 Jul 2011 20:19:10 +0200, Arlet Ottens wrote:> On 07/21/2011 08:14 PM, Tim Wescott wrote: > >> I'm using the gnu-arm tool chain, built from source*. It works fine. >> >> How much does CodeSourcery want for the 'real' tools? >> >> * I'm not saying it was _free_, but I built the tool chain when I was >> between contracts, so it was relatively cheap. > > For my last project, I downloaded the free CodeSourcery Lite binary > toolchain. It works fine, and only took a few minutes to > download/install.There was some reason why that wasn't working for me -- but I can't remember what it was. I think it was that I was getting much better luck with getting C++ to work with the gnuarm stuff (with options properly set) than I was with their binary. 'course, that may have changed now. -- www.wescottdesign.com
Reply by ●July 21, 20112011-07-21
The flash is the biggest part of the die, no ? So why not 32-bit, as long as code density is reasonable ? For that matter, cutting the instruction set down from M3 to M0 is arguably not worth the extra cost in instructions/flash use... I'm using an NXP LPC11xx Cortex-M0 at the moment, and it doesn't need a crystal, external reset mgt, or many other bits the 8051 this is replacing needed, so in total much cheaper than the 8-bitter it replaced. So yup, I think nearly the end-of-the-line for most 8-bit applications ? Best Regards, Dave
Reply by ●July 21, 20112011-07-21
On Jul 21, 11:14=A0am, Tim Wescott <t...@seemywebsite.com> wrote:> On Thu, 21 Jul 2011 11:06:23 -0700, linnix wrote: > > On Jul 21, 9:46=A0am, Tauno Voipio <tauno.voi...@notused.fi.invalid> > > wrote: > >> On 21.7.11 6:30 , Antoni Lacasta i Sull=E0 wrote: > > >> > Hi, > > >> > During the latest months I have been receiving offers for 32-bit > >> > MCU's, mostly based on ARM-Cortex CPU's, at prices I'm currently > >> > paying for 8-bit devices, or even cheaper! This has brought me to > >> > benchmark them with the MCU independent part of my C++ code and > >> > surprisingly the results are quite similar. > > >> > Same price, same flash consumption ... what do yo think? Is this the > >> > end of the 8-bit's? I guess it is. > > >> > Regards, > >> > Toni. > > >> I just redesigned an old card using a 8051, an A/D converter, a static > >> RAM (2 kilobytes) and some glue logic. The new card was done with a > >> Stellaris Cortex, LM3S818. All the IC:s on the new card costed togethe=r> >> less than the A/D converter chip on the old design. > > >> When our current AVR -based designs need to be replaced, the Stellaris > >> chips are the potential replacements. > > >> The Stellaris chips run fast with minimal electricity, but there is th=e> >> price of a quite complicated set-up of the master and peripheral clock=s> >> and port pins. > > > Except for the price of the tools. =A0AVR and PIC tools are still much > > cheaper. =A0We expect to spend around $1k for the new tools; > > unfortunately, the cheap/low cost version won't cut it. > > I'm using the gnu-arm tool chain, built from source*. =A0It works fine.Does it work for Freescale's Cortex M4 w/ DSP?> > How much does CodeSourcery want for the 'real' tools?Around 1K for most of them.> > * I'm not saying it was _free_, but I built the tool chain when I was > between contracts, so it was relatively cheap. > > --www.wescottdesign.com
Reply by ●July 21, 20112011-07-21
On Thu, 21 Jul 2011 12:15:19 -0700, linnix wrote:> On Jul 21, 11:14 am, Tim Wescott <t...@seemywebsite.com> wrote: >> On Thu, 21 Jul 2011 11:06:23 -0700, linnix wrote: >> > On Jul 21, 9:46 am, Tauno Voipio <tauno.voi...@notused.fi.invalid> >> > wrote: >> >> On 21.7.11 6:30 , Antoni Lacasta i Sullà wrote: >> >> >> > Hi, >> >> >> > During the latest months I have been receiving offers for 32-bit >> >> > MCU's, mostly based on ARM-Cortex CPU's, at prices I'm currently >> >> > paying for 8-bit devices, or even cheaper! This has brought me to >> >> > benchmark them with the MCU independent part of my C++ code and >> >> > surprisingly the results are quite similar. >> >> >> > Same price, same flash consumption ... what do yo think? Is this >> >> > the end of the 8-bit's? I guess it is. >> >> >> > Regards, >> >> > Toni. >> >> >> I just redesigned an old card using a 8051, an A/D converter, a >> >> static RAM (2 kilobytes) and some glue logic. The new card was done >> >> with a Stellaris Cortex, LM3S818. All the IC:s on the new card >> >> costed together less than the A/D converter chip on the old design. >> >> >> When our current AVR -based designs need to be replaced, the >> >> Stellaris chips are the potential replacements. >> >> >> The Stellaris chips run fast with minimal electricity, but there is >> >> the price of a quite complicated set-up of the master and peripheral >> >> clocks and port pins. >> >> > Except for the price of the tools. AVR and PIC tools are still much >> > cheaper. We expect to spend around $1k for the new tools; >> > unfortunately, the cheap/low cost version won't cut it. >> >> I'm using the gnu-arm tool chain, built from source*. It works fine. > > Does it work for Freescale's Cortex M4 w/ DSP?I don't know -- but it took to the Cortex M3 like wildfire. I suspect that the best you could hope for would be that the 'ordinary' C and C++ stuff would compile just fine, but anything DSP would have to be done in assembly, by hand. But then, that's the best I've ever gotten out of a 'paid for' tool chain.>> How much does CodeSourcery want for the 'real' tools? > > Around 1K for most of them.Then unless you're facing a period of forced unemployment, just plain want to learn how to build the tools, or head up a big group and can set one person to being "the tools guy" it's probably worth it to buy, or to try out their free tool chain.>> * I'm not saying it was _free_, but I built the tool chain when I was >> between contracts, so it was relatively cheap.-- www.wescottdesign.com
