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FEBRUARY 2005 | |
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February 2005 - In This Issue [Cover Story] Structured ASICs Plan To Outpace FPGAs System architects generally turn to application-specific integrated circuits (ASICs) when designing ICs for high-volume, high-performance applications. Yet the development of such ASICs calls for expensive design tools. It also invites high development costs and extended time to market. To conquer these problems, Altera recently introduced its third-generation structured ASIC: the 90-nm HardCopy II family. The HardCopy II structured ASICs were created as an alternative to... — Nancy Friedrich [Design Application] FPGAs Build Bridges To Wireless Connectivity The need for wireless connectivity in embedded systems is growing. In general, connectivity is becoming widespread as consumers and enterprises alike become accustomed to having continual access to information resources. As a result, information appliances like PDAs are adding capabilities for voice and data transmission. This connectivity allows more traditional embedded systems to report information to a central clearinghouse and obtain information from outside sources. In addition,... — Bernhard Andretzky Virtual Prototypes Cut Software Bottleneck As the software content in today's 2.5G and 3G phones rapidly increases, timely software development is becoming critical for product success. The traditional development flow—in which software design isn't started until after hardware design is complete or nearly complete—simply breaks down. The resulting design cycle is too long for the competitive wireless market. In addition, dealing with the hardware-software interaction after most of the hardware has been defined can yield... — Thomas Anderson , et al. WLAN Testing Relies On Controlled RF The wireless enterprise environment operates under very different conditions than wired networks. As a result, this environment requires a fresh outlook on testing. For wireless LANs (WLANs) to succeed in the enterprise, developers must rely on system-level test solutions. Such solutions must produce repeatable outcomes, scale beyond a single device to a network, and provide systems designers with an automated solution that will decrease the cost per test. As discussed last month... — Graham Celine [New Products] TD-SCDMA Chip Set Aids 3G Developers As far as consumer adoption goes, China is predicted to be the next great handset market. As a result, many companies are working to get their products and technologies into those devices. In its SoftFone-LCR chip set, for example, Analog Devices now offers a complete chip set for developers of 3G mobile terminals based on the TD-SCDMA Low Chip Rate (LCR) air interface. Powered by ADI's Blackfin processor, the chip set provides all of the critical functions that are needed to build a... — Staff Integrated Circuits Embed Wi-Fi In Portables With the launch of a range of single-chip Wi-Fi devices, CSR now offers designers a Wi-Fi implementation that specifically targets cell phones and other pocket-sized consumer products. Examples of such products include digital cameras and MP3 players. CSR's UniFi ICs combine up to three Wi-Fi standards into one chip. Because UniFi does not rely on a host processor, it also is suitable for embedding Wi-Fi in consumer-electronic devices like DVD or video players and plasma screens.... — Staff EMI Filter Arrays Stave Off Electrostatic Discharge A series of four electromagnetic-interference (EMI) filter arrays vows to provide electrostatic-discharge (ESD) protection in thin DFN packages. These four-channel, six-channel, and eight-channel filters were specifically designed for the high-speed data interfaces in mobile phones. Compared to traditional chip-scale packages, they provide high performance and reliability in a drop-in replacement footprint (1.35 × 3 mm). All of the filters come in a TDFN package to provide... — Staff Bluetooth Chips Support SDR Protocol The BlueMoon UniCellular chip for Bluetooth wireless applications is three times faster than any classical Bluetooth solution. The single chip supports the Version 2.0 Bluetooth standard as well as the new Enhanced Data Rate (EDR) functionality. In addition, it has extremely low power consumption. It also possesses excellent radio-frequency characteristics, which make it well suited for use in GSM, EDGE, and UMTS mobile phones. The chip's Enhanced Data Rate functionality will... — Staff Oscillator Delivers High Stability In Small Package In a crystal oscillator, ambient temperature variation is one of the main causes of frequency variation. To overcome such variation, C-MAC's TC-OCXOs use a hybrid combination of limited temperature control by use of an oven. They further reduce the remaining frequency error through the use of the company's Pluto temperature-compensation ASIC. The company's new series of temperature-compensated, oven-controlled crystal oscillators (TC-OCXOs) also is designed to deliver the high stability of... — Staff Wi-Fi Test System Evaluates Networks Although Wi-Fi networks are increasingly being adopted by consumers and enterprises, ways to test these networks are still emerging. An example is CMC's EE-WPA multi-station test system. Using this system, designers, test managers, and network engineers gain the ability to perform sophisticated capacity, scalability, and load stress testing on WPA-enabled enterprise-class products and wireless networks. The system is for WPA-Enterprise with full support for 802.1x authentication, RADIUS,... — Staff [Column] Microwave Absorbers Help Wi-Fi Perform Wi-Fi is truly ushering in a communications revolution. This technology is the first of its kind in an age when thousands of people are unplugging their phone jacks. Now, the wireless Internet is beginning to fully encompass the globe without phone lines and buried cable. During the past year, manufacturers of materials that control electromagnetic interference have been providing supporting technology to the network-infrastructure companies that manufacture indoor/outdoor Wi-Fi switches. ... — James Delprete Can Access And Privacy Survive Next-Generation Systems? The mechanistic world view, taking the play of physical particles as ultimate reality, found its expression in a civilization which glorifies physical technology that has led eventually to the catastrophes of our time. Possibly the model of the world as a great organization can help to reinforce the sense of reverence for the living which we have almost lost in the last sanguinary decades of human history.—Ludwig von Bertalanffy At first, access and privacy seem to be... — Ryan Olson [News] Wi-Fi Network Security Goes Enterprise-Wide Wireless local-area networks (WLANs) bring a host of advantages to the enterprises that deploy them. They foster creativity of the most positive sort by enabling users to roam freely within the network's range. Unfortunately, however, that same free access can leave the enterprise open to mischief or worse. With 60% of enterprises having some sort of WLAN access, the Gartner Group recently predicted that WLANs pose the largest security problem through 2008. Enterprises with WLANs have seen... — Lisa Maliniak WiMAX Sets Its Sights On Fixed Networks Third-generation network service providers are eager to augment their existing wireless offerings with WiMAX technology. This step is vital to the evolution from fixed broadband wireless to the widespread availability of mobile broadband wireless. WiMAX, which is based on the IEEE 802.16 standard, complements existing 3G networks. It creates a converged service offering that users can access using a broad range of devices on a wide variety of networks. Through a strategic... — Lisa Maliniak Broadband Wireless Security Grows Military-Level Muscle The security of broadband wireless networks is on the minds of users, equipment OEMs, and service providers alike. Many organizations rely on high-speed IP/Ethernet data communications. They have adopted broadband wireless networking as a means of gaining bandwidth and lowering costs. As with wired networks, however, data on wireless networks must be safeguarded from unauthorized access or manipulation. In these times of heightened national security, the integrity of government... — Lisa Maliniak Three-Transceiver Mimo Integrated Circuit Boosts Bandwidths Users have an insatiable need for bandwidth. As a result, wireless-product OEMs are looking to incorporate data rates that are higher than those permitted by existing 802.11a/g standards. Some are eyeing the emerging Multiple-Input Multiple-Output (MIMO) standard, which is also known as 802.11n. It promises to achieve data rates of more than 200 Mbps. To aid in their quest, Athena Semiconductors and Samsung Electronics' Digital Media R&D Center have developed a three-transceiver RF... — Lisa Maliniak Core And Software Spawn VoWLAN Devices Traditionally, multichannel VoIP applications like residential gateways, voice-over-WLAN (VoWLAN) phones, and terminal adapters have used two processors. A host CPU runs the operating system and protocols while a dedicated VoIP DSP handles the codecs and other components. These processors would require separate development teams using different toolsets. But cost and time-to-market pressures are pushing OEMs of VoWLAN and VoIP equipment to seek single-CPU implementations. To that... — Lisa Maliniak Flash-Density Doubling Leads To More Handset Memory Mobile handsets are evolving rapidly. Much of this evolution is dependent upon memory advances. For example, look to Spansion (www.spansion.com), the Flash-memory subsidiary of AMD and Fujitsu Ltd. It expects Flash-memory requirements for mainstream phones to jump from about 150 Mb per phone in 2004 to over 500 Mb in 2007. High-end phones require even more Flash memory. They'll rise from about 750 Mb today to an estimated 5 Gb and beyond in 2007. In keeping with this outlook,... — Lisa Maliniak [Editor's Note] Billing Issues Leave Users Unsatisfied A few months ago, my husband and I decided to purchase new cell phones. We opted to stay with our existing carrier and called to see what type of deals were available for new phones. When we found out that we were each eligible for a $150 rebate, we went to the store to compare the newest makes and models. It quickly became clear that we could choose a basic 2G phone or a full-featured phone with all of the newest bells and whistles—video capability, color display, camera, etc. There... — Nancy Friedrich [On The Wireless Front] On The Wireless Front Seoul, Korea Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. has developed an eight-die multi-chip-package (MCP) technology. This technology was designed for use in high-capacity mobile devices, such as third-generation (3G) handsets and other increasingly smaller mobile devices. Typically, as the number of chips per memory package increases, so does the thickness of the package. Using its Wafer Supporting System technology to makes wafers thinner during design... — Staff |
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