AVR looking weak against TI and Cygnal

Greetings:

Of course we haven't seen them yet, but when 25MHz MSP430s come along, 
with their fast 12-bit A/D and D/A capabilities, combined with the 
Cygnal 100MIPS 8051 derivatives with fast 12-bit A/D and D/A as well, 
the AVR with its 16MIPS and only 10-bit A/D slow 15ksps with no 
dedicated D/A hardware, is looking a bit on the meager side.

Is Atmel going to try to compete with these Cygnal and TI offerings 
(even at 8MHz, the 16-bit MSP430 core is of similar performance to the 
16 MHz AVRs, lower power, and much better analog IO).

I'd really like to see some 33-40MHz AVR offerings, and some with 
substantially improved A/D like 12-bit 100ksps, and some with 2 12-bit 
DAC channels.

Whadaya think?  What is Atmel's plan regarding what part of the uC 
market they want the AVR to occupy?  Do they want it to be a low-power 
(though higher than MSP430) mid-performance uC only, or to be able to 
compete on all tiers?

Good day!

-- 
____________________________________
Christopher R. Carlen
Principal Laser/Optical Technologist
Sandia National Laboratories CA USA
crcarle@sandia.gov

Chris Carlen wrote:

> Greetings:
> 
> Of course we haven't seen them yet, but when 25MHz MSP430s come along, 
> with their fast 12-bit A/D and D/A capabilities, combined with the 
> Cygnal 100MIPS 8051 derivatives with fast 12-bit A/D and D/A as well, 
> the AVR with its 16MIPS and only 10-bit A/D slow 15ksps with no 
> dedicated D/A hardware, is looking a bit on the meager side.
> 
> Is Atmel going to try to compete with these Cygnal and TI offerings 
> (even at 8MHz, the 16-bit MSP430 core is of similar performance to the 
> 16 MHz AVRs, lower power, and much better analog IO).
> 
> I'd really like to see some 33-40MHz AVR offerings, and some with 
> substantially improved A/D like 12-bit 100ksps, and some with 2 12-bit 
> DAC channels.
> 
> Whadaya think?  What is Atmel's plan regarding what part of the uC 
> market they want the AVR to occupy?  Do they want it to be a low-power 
> (though higher than MSP430) mid-performance uC only, or to be able to 
> compete on all tiers?

There is also the Philips LPC2100 ARM family: very easy to use, 60 MHz 
operation (54 MIPS), 32 bits, plenty of I/Os, lots of peripherals, and < 
$10.

Leon
-- 
Leon Heller, G1HSM
Email: aqzf13@dsl.pipex.com
My low-cost Philips LPC210x ARM develpment system:
http://www.geocities.com/leon_heller/lpc2104.html

Leon Heller wrote:
> Chris Carlen wrote:
>> Greetings:
>>
>> Of course we haven't seen them yet, but when 25MHz MSP430s come along, 
>> with their fast 12-bit A/D and D/A capabilities, combined with the 
>> Cygnal 100MIPS 8051 derivatives with fast 12-bit A/D and D/A as well, 
>> the AVR with its 16MIPS and only 10-bit A/D slow 15ksps with no 
>> dedicated D/A hardware, is looking a bit on the meager side.

Cygnal have 1MSPS 16 bit ADC, and have 24 bit ADC comming.
As well as the MSP430, TI also have the [BurrBrown] MSC12xx family,
with 24 bit ADCs, and 16 bit DACs.
Also from TI, are sub $10 FLASH DSPs, with 12 bit/6MSPS ADCs

>>
>> Is Atmel going to try to compete with these Cygnal and TI offerings 
>> (even at 8MHz, the 16-bit MSP430 core is of similar performance to the 
>> 16 MHz AVRs, lower power, and much better analog IO).
>>
>> I'd really like to see some 33-40MHz AVR offerings, and some with 
>> substantially improved A/D like 12-bit 100ksps, and some with 2 12-bit 
>> DAC channels.
>>
>> Whadaya think?  What is Atmel's plan regarding what part of the uC 
>> market they want the AVR to occupy?  Do they want it to be a low-power 
>> (though higher than MSP430) mid-performance uC only, or to be able to 
>> compete on all tiers?

  High performance Analog is non-trivial, and tends to come only from
companies with a proven track record in ADC designs.

  Raw MHz is less a challenge, and tends to come from normal shrink
timelines and/or more efficent FLASH Bandwidth design.

  Atmel _do_ have a niche in GHz ADCs, but I'm not sure you'd paste one
of those next to a AVR :)

> 
> There is also the Philips LPC2100 ARM family: very easy to use, 60 MHz 
> operation (54 MIPS), 32 bits, plenty of I/Os, lots of peripherals, and < 
> $10.

  (Don't forget the up to 64K Bytes of RAM..)
Certainly these Philips & TI 32 bit offerings will put real pressure
on the upper end of 64-128K byte AVRs/PICs in the long term.

-jg

Chris Carlen wrote:
> 
> Of course we haven't seen them yet, but when 25MHz MSP430s come along,
> with their fast 12-bit A/D and D/A capabilities, combined with the
> Cygnal 100MIPS 8051 derivatives with fast 12-bit A/D and D/A as well,
> the AVR with its 16MIPS and only 10-bit A/D slow 15ksps with no
> dedicated D/A hardware, is looking a bit on the meager side.

I think one salient point of the Cygnal (and other) devices is
their membership in the ubiquitous 8051 family, with many
suppliers available.

The problem with the MSP430 (and others) is their single supplier
condition.  I think TI would do well to license the designs to
other manufacturers, and aim for a similar wide family.

We never had any qualms in the old days about using the 8080,
8086, 8088, 8049, 8051, z80, 6502 and derivatives therefrom,
because multiple suppliers were always available.  However the
Motorola competition (6800, 6808, 68000) fell because of
availability.

-- 
Chuck F (cbfalconer@yahoo.com) (cbfalconer@worldnet.att.net)
   Available for consulting/temporary embedded and systems.
   <http://cbfalconer.home.att.net>  USE worldnet address!

Leon Heller <aqzf13@dsl.pipex.com> wrote in message news:<3fe20189$0$25673
$cc9e4d1f@news.dial.pipex.com>...
> 
> There is also the Philips LPC2100 ARM family: very easy to use, 60 MHz 
> operation (54 MIPS), 32 bits, plenty of I/Os, lots of peripherals, and < 
> $10.

where did you get this quote?
EUR 12 (approx. $15) is what we get from our distributor for 250 pcs
tray (6-8 weeks for delivery outch!)
EUR 15 (approx. $20) for smaller quantities

also you can add: immature chips (probably with lot of bugs on the
first releases - philips is hurrying to throw on the market chip but
they still have no completely datasheets written), no code protection
scheme i.e. everybody can copy your design ... at this point LPC2100
is still great entry level for learning ARM7 architecture, assemler
etc, but IMO for now can't be considered for any serious job

Best regards
Tsvetan
---
PCB prototypes for $26 at http://run.to/pcb
(http://www.olimex.com/pcb)
Development boards for PIC, AVR and MSP430 
(http://www.olimex.com/dev)

Tsvetan Usunov wrote:

> Leon Heller <aqzf13@dsl.pipex.com> wrote in message news:<3fe20189$0$25673
> $cc9e4d1f@news.dial.pipex.com>...
> 
>>There is also the Philips LPC2100 ARM family: very easy to use, 60 MHz 
>>operation (54 MIPS), 32 bits, plenty of I/Os, lots of peripherals, and < 
>>$10.
> 
> 
> where did you get this quote?
> EUR 12 (approx. $15) is what we get from our distributor for 250 pcs
> tray (6-8 weeks for delivery outch!)
> EUR 15 (approx. $20) for smaller quantities


I paid 7.75 GBP each (about $13) for 20 off LPC2106 from my distributor: 
Silica/Avnet, here in the UK. The pound is strong against the dollar at 
present, which helps. I think the '2104 is under $10 in quantity, here. 
How about me buying your chips here and selling them on to you, I can 
probably get 100 pcs immediately. 8-)

> 
> also you can add: immature chips (probably with lot of bugs on the
> first releases - philips is hurrying to throw on the market chip but
> they still have no completely datasheets written), no code protection
> scheme i.e. everybody can copy your design ... at this point LPC2100
> is still great entry level for learning ARM7 architecture, assemler
> etc, but IMO for now can't be considered for any serious job

It's still a very nice chip, and should prove *very* popular, IMHO.

Leon
-- 
Leon Heller, G1HSM
Email: aqzf13@dsl.pipex.com
My low-cost Philips LPC210x ARM development system:
http://www.geocities.com/leon_heller/lpc2104.html

"Chris Carlen" <crcarle@BOGUS.sandia.gov> wrote in message
news:brsqbr02b5v@enews2.newsguy.com...
> ... even at 8MHz, the 16-bit MSP430 core is of similar performance to the
> 16 MHz AVRs, ....
>
I beg to differ.  Having used the MSP430 for some time, I recently
benchmarked it against the AVR for an IP stack app.  The AVR won hands down.
The MSP430 might be comparable to the AVR for 16 bit stuff, but an 8 bit
app. is much faster on the AVR.  The problem is that an MSP430 averages
about 4 cycles per instruction, giving about 2 mips for an 8MHz part (6 and
a bit for 25MHz) whereas the AVR averages about 1.8 cycles per instruction
for about 9 Mips.  The MSP430 is a fantastic low power processor with a
bunch of peripherals available but its speed is not quite in the same
ballpark as the AVR.

Now the ARM is a different container of herrings altogether.

Cheers,
--
Alf Katz
alfkatz@remove.the.obvious.ieee.org


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"Chris Carlen" <crcarle@BOGUS.sandia.gov> wrote in message
news:brsqbr02b5v@enews2.newsguy.com...
> Greetings:
>
> Of course we haven't seen them yet, but when 25MHz MSP430s come along,
> with their fast 12-bit A/D and D/A capabilities, combined with the
> Cygnal 100MIPS 8051 derivatives with fast 12-bit A/D and D/A as well,
> the AVR with its 16MIPS and only 10-bit A/D slow 15ksps with no
> dedicated D/A hardware, is looking a bit on the meager side.
>
> Is Atmel going to try to compete with these Cygnal and TI offerings
> (even at 8MHz, the 16-bit MSP430 core is of similar performance to the
> 16 MHz AVRs, lower power, and much better analog IO).
>
> I'd really like to see some 33-40MHz AVR offerings, and some with
> substantially improved A/D like 12-bit 100ksps, and some with 2 12-bit
> DAC channels.

The FPSLIC will of course get you 25 MHz today, and probably 33-40 MHz
when the 0,18u chips are out next year.
The ATmega8 is running 33 MHz in the lab so it does not seem to be totally
unfeasable
to release higher speed parts.

-- 
Best Regards
Ulf at atmel dot com
These comments are intended to be my own opinion and they
may, or may not be shared by my employer, Atmel Sweden.

>
> Whadaya think?  What is Atmel's plan regarding what part of the uC
> market they want the AVR to occupy?  Do they want it to be a low-power
> (though higher than MSP430) mid-performance uC only, or to be able to
> compete on all tiers?
>
> Good day!
>
> -- 
> ____________________________________
> Christopher R. Carlen
> Principal Laser/Optical Technologist
> Sandia National Laboratories CA USA
> crcarle@sandia.gov
>

Ulf Samuelsson wrote:
> "Chris Carlen" <crcarle@BOGUS.sandia.gov> wrote in message
> news:brsqbr02b5v@enews2.newsguy.com...
> 
>>Greetings:
>>
>>Of course we haven't seen them yet, but when 25MHz MSP430s come along,
>>with their fast 12-bit A/D and D/A capabilities, combined with the
>>Cygnal 100MIPS 8051 derivatives with fast 12-bit A/D and D/A as well,
>>the AVR with its 16MIPS and only 10-bit A/D slow 15ksps with no
>>dedicated D/A hardware, is looking a bit on the meager side.
>>
>>Is Atmel going to try to compete with these Cygnal and TI offerings
>>(even at 8MHz, the 16-bit MSP430 core is of similar performance to the
>>16 MHz AVRs, lower power, and much better analog IO).
>>
>>I'd really like to see some 33-40MHz AVR offerings, and some with
>>substantially improved A/D like 12-bit 100ksps, and some with 2 12-bit
>>DAC channels.
> 
> 
> The FPSLIC will of course get you 25 MHz today, and probably 33-40 MHz
> when the 0,18u chips are out next year.
> The ATmega8 is running 33 MHz in the lab so it does not seem to be totally
> unfeasable
> to release higher speed parts.
> 

Hi Ulf!

Yes, the FPSLIC is a bit better.  But I guess I'm more interested in 
seeing better analog IO, including DACs on the plain controllers, as 
well as a moderate boost in speed.  Even 25MHz would be nice for the 
time being.

Is the mega8 at 33MHz just an overclocked standard mega8 (whatever 0,NNu 
process you are using for production megas right now), or is it a new 
process?  Does it mean Atmel actually intends an upgrade to the speed 
capabilities of the AVR-mega family anytime soon (or later)?

Thanks for input.

Good day!

-- 
____________________________________
Christopher R. Carlen
Principal Laser/Optical Technologist
Sandia National Laboratories CA USA
crcarle@sandia.gov

Unbeliever wrote:
> "Chris Carlen" <crcarle@BOGUS.sandia.gov> wrote in message
> news:brsqbr02b5v@enews2.newsguy.com...
> 
>>... even at 8MHz, the 16-bit MSP430 core is of similar performance to the
>>16 MHz AVRs, ....
>>
> 
> I beg to differ.  Having used the MSP430 for some time, I recently
> benchmarked it against the AVR for an IP stack app.  The AVR won hands down.
> The MSP430 might be comparable to the AVR for 16 bit stuff, but an 8 bit
> app. is much faster on the AVR.  The problem is that an MSP430 averages
> about 4 cycles per instruction, giving about 2 mips for an 8MHz part (6 and
> a bit for 25MHz) whereas the AVR averages about 1.8 cycles per instruction
> for about 9 Mips.  The MSP430 is a fantastic low power processor with a
> bunch of peripherals available but its speed is not quite in the same
> ballpark as the AVR.

Hmm.  I see.  Thanks for the input.  I haven't actually worked with 
MSP430, but have been considering that if and when a 25MHz MSP430 
becomes available, to weigh it against the AVR as a possible replacement 
for some signal synthesis applications that are pushing the AVR to it's 
limits.

Perhaps I'd be better served by just a faster AVR, though I like the 
integrated 12-bit analog IO on AVR's competitors.  Since I know and 
*really* like the AVR architecture, and the tools are cheap and easy, 
I'd much rather stick with it than say, work with the Cygnal parts. 
8051, blech!  I don't care that the 8051 is big-time, since I do mainly 
laboratory instrumentation where easy=fast results is more important 
that product margins for million unit sales.

> Now the ARM is a different container of herrings altogether.

Yes, and it's something I'll have to delve into at some point.  I was 
actually hoping the Motorola 68000 family stuff like Dragonball would 
remain of similar popularity to the ARM, but that doesn't seem to be the 
likely outcome.  I figured the 68k assembly language would be a cinch to 
learn, compared to ARM (I figure I will need to understand the assembly 
to work competently with any CPU, since there are times when I have to 
step through the compiler output to make sure it's doing things right). 
  But now I feel it might not be worth the effort to learn the 68000 
considering it seems to be fading and ARM taking over.

Good day!



-- 
____________________________________
Christopher R. Carlen
Principal Laser/Optical Technologist
Sandia National Laboratories CA USA
crcarle@sandia.gov