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Segger starts to add STOP to Embedded Studio for Arm

Tue, Jun 20, 2023

The latest release of Segger’s Embedded Studio for Arm is supplied with STOP (stack overflow prevention) designed to reliably prevent stack overflows. With STOP ena-bled, the compiler adds a call to a stack limit-check routine wherever necessary, before adjusting the stack pointer.

The STOP option for the Segger Compiler can be easily switched on, without any change to application code. This way, all stack overflows are prevented. If a stack overflow has been prevented, the system can enter a safe state and recover.

STOP has a surprisingly low impact on size and speed. It adds only about two to five per cent to code size and execution time, which typically does not have a significant impact on the performance of the system.

A stack overflow can cause all kinds of failures in an embedded system, from hard-to-detect, seemingly random miscomputations to severe malfunctions or even crashes.

STOP protects all stacks in the system. It protects the process stack, as well as the main stack used for interrupts. It can be used with any real time operating system (RTOS), provided the RTOS updates the stack-limit variable on a context switch.

The technology is currently available for Thumb-2 architectures such as Cortex-M4, Cortex-M7, Cortex-A9, and Cortex-A15.

On ARMv7M architectures, STOP is ready to use in Embedded Studio with a single project option switch.

The STOP feature is recommended for all, but deemed essential for safety critical applications, said Segger, which believes it is the only company offering such technology today. It can be used by software engineers, students or hobbyists. “It takes less than 15 minutes, is easy and hassle-free,” said Rolf Segger, the company’s founder. It is also cost-free for evaluation, education, and non-commercial purposes.

Embedded Studio is Segger’s multi-platform IDE (integrated development environment). Characterised by its flexibility of use, it includes all the tools and features a developer needs for professional embedded C and C++ programming and development. It comes with Segger’s optimised emRun runtime and emFloat floating-point libraries, as well as Segger’s smart Linker, all of which have been developed from the ground up specifically for resource-constrained embedded systems. In combination with the Clang-based optimising C/C++ Segger compiler, extremely small yet efficient programs can be generated, putting every byte to work.

Embedded Studio is available on all platforms (Linux, macOS, and Windows) on Arm, Intel, and Apple Silicon.

http://www.segger.com

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Protocol analyser extends PCI Express 6.0 protocol validation

Tue, Jun 20, 2023

Believed to be the first PCI Express (PCIe) 6.0 protocol validation tools, the cable-free protocol analyser and protocol exerciser enable semiconductor, computer, and peripheral makers to perform complete silicon chip, root complex, and endpoint system verification in a real time development environment, said Keysight Technologies.

The PCIe 6.0 specification is a new high-speed serial interface standard released by the PCI-SIG supporting the higher data traffic and bandwidth requirements of data centres. The standard enables new designs for servers, endpoint devices, switches, storage devices, and compute engines at speeds up to 64Gtransfers (Gt) per second, equipment and device companies need protocol test solutions to validate PCIe 6.0 technology designs and ensure interoperability with other PCIe 6.0 specification compliant designs.

PCI Express 6.0-based I/O technology is expected to deliver a breakthrough performance in high-performance I/O interfaces and enable innovations including accelerator interconnects like Compute Express Link (CXL) and on-chip communications such as Universal Chiplet Interconnect Express. 

The cable-free PCIe 6.0 protocol analyser and PCIe 6.0 protocol exerciser enable analysis of the data link / transaction layer of PCIe 6.0 technology designs. They also support all PCIe technology speeds 2.5, 5.0, 8.0, 16, 32 and 64GT per second (PAM4) and lane widths from one to 16.

It also provides emulation of root complex and endpoint devices when validating PCIe and CXL technology designs and supports debugging with PCIe 6.0 technology and CXL 1.1 / 2.0 protocol visualisation and analysis tools.

Other features are cable-free protocol analysis in a streamlined card electromechanical (CEM) form factor and a complete PCIe 6.0 standard test solution for the entire design cycle.

Dr. Joachim Peerlings, vice president of network and data centre solutions at Keysight commented: “In the race to advance artificial intelligence applications, physical layer and protocol validation of devices including networking interface cards, graphics processing units, and accelerators is key.”

http://www.keysight.com

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0.25w InGaP HBT PAs are AEX-Q100-qualified

Mon, Jun 19, 2023

Linear power amplifiers (Pas) by Guerrilla RF are intended for automotive and 5G infrastructure in the 2.5 and 3.6GHz bands.

The GRF5526, GRF5526W, GRF5536 and GRF5536W have been added to the company’s InGaP HBT PA series. The complete series now covers all primary cellular bands spanning 615 to 4200MHz.

The GRF5526W and GRF5536W are the first of the GRF55xx series to be AEC-Q100-qualified for automotive applications. The full qualification is targeted to be completed by the end of the summer, with advance production quantities available now.

All four PAs are also suitable for the 5G cellular boosters / repeaters and cellular compensators / compensators associated with automotive shark fin antennas.

The new linear PAs targeting 5G wireless infrastructure applications requiring exceptional native linearity over 100MHz bandwidths and over a wide temperature range of -40 to +105 degrees C. Each can deliver up to 23dBm of output power over the entire temperature range with better than -45dBc of ACLR performance and EVM levels less one per cent – all without the aid of supplemental linearisation schemes like digital pre-distortion (DPD).

The ability to beat the -45dBc ACLR (adjacent channel leakage ratio) performance metric without DPD is critical for size, cost and power-sensitive cellular applications like home and commercial repeaters/boosters, femtocells, picocells and cable loss compensators found in automobiles.

The PAs span frequencies 2.3 to 2.7GHz and 3.3 to 4.2GHz respectively, the GRF5526 / GRF5526W and GRF5536 / GRF5536W are tuned to operate within the n7, n30, n38, n40, n41, n48, n53, n77, n88 and n90 5G new radio (NR) bands.

Target applications are home and commercial repeaters/boosters, femtocells, and picocells, as well as cable loss compensators which are used in conjunction with automotive ‘shark fin’ antennas. In each of these use cases, the sensitivity to cost, power and size constraints prohibits the use of elaborate linearisation techniques like DPD, explained Guerrilla RF. Instead, designers must rely on the power amplifier’s native linearity to meet the stringent emissions mask requirements imposed by the latest 5G standards.

With the introduction of the GRF5526 and GRF5536 Guerrilla RF now has a complete suite of commercially available linear PAs addressing all bands targeted by our 5G and automotive customer base, said Jim Ahne, Guerrilla RF’s vice president of automotive and 5G products. “The GRF5536 variants are particularly noteworthy since they capitalise on the growing popularity of the C-band – what many in the industry hail as the most attractive spectrum for 5G applications due to its ideal blend of propagation coverage and available bandwidth,” he added.

Variants of the GRF55xx family – including the GRF5526W and GRF5536W – are being qualified for full AEC-Q100 compliance. By the end of the summer, Guerrilla RF will have introduced multiple -W variants of linear PAs.

The GRF5526, GRF5526W, GRF5536 and GRF5536W come in pin-compatible 3.0 x 3.0mm, 16-pin QFN packages. Samples and evaluation boards are available for all four components.

https://guerrilla-rf.com

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Apollo MxFE prepares for next-gen RF design

Fri, Jun 16, 2023

Aerospace and defence, instrumentation and next-generation wireless communications can use the Apollo MxFE software defined, direct RF sampling, wideband mixed signal front end platform from Analog Devices (ADI).

It enables next-generation applications such as phased array radar, electronic surveillance, test and measurement and 6G communications, explained ADI.

The growth of data intensive applications is increasing the need for wider bandwidths and more rapid processing and analysis of data for 5G, 6G, Wi-Fi 7 and Wi-Fi 8, radar, signal intelligence, and other applications at the network edge which require higher speed data conversion and processing capabilities with reduced electronic testing complexity.

Developed for application versatility and rapid customisation, the Apollo MxFE offers instantaneous bandwidths up to 10GHz while directly sampling and synthesising frequencies up to 18GHz (Ku Band). This monolithic 16nm CMOS device uses high dynamic range RF ADC and RF DAC cores with the best spurious free dynamic range and noise spectral density available on the market today, said ADI. As such, Apollo MxFE helps customers accelerate design cycles and bring new products to market faster and at lower cost, while future-proofing their product designs.

Bryan Goldstein, vice president, aerospace and defence at ADI, said: “Apollo MxFE gives design engineers the flexibility to design for . . . today, as well as an ability to enhance performance over time using simple, software-defined design changes”.

Apollo MxFE’s 4T4R product offers four 12-bit RF ADCs with a sample rate up to 20Gsamples per second, four 16-bit RF DACs with a sample rate up to 28Gsamples per second, an RF input bandwidth from DC to 18GHz (Ku Band) and an instantaneous bandwidth up to 10GHz. Apollo MxFE is believed to be the industry’s first integrated radio that is capable of directly interfacing to the emerging 6G frequency bands from 7GHz to 15GHz.

The on-chip digital signal processing (DSP) offers a real-time FFT sniffer, a full-rate programmable FIR filter, a 128-tap complex FIR filter, fast-hopping NCOs, DDCs/DUCs, and a fractional sample rate converter. The DSP is dynamically configurable, allowing for rapid changes between narrowband and wideband profiles without taking down the JESD link. Apollo MxFE supports JESD 204B/C and a very short reach (VSR) interface.

Apollo MxFE’s 8T8R product offers eight RF ADCs with a sample rate up to 8GSPS, eight RF DACs with a sample rate up to 16GSPS, an RF input bandwidth up to 16GHz, and an instantaneous bandwidth up to 3GHz. The on-chip DSP offers similar features and functionality to the 4T4R device with double the number of digital blocks, all dynamically configurable.

Apollo MxFE is augmented by variable gain amplifiers, low noise LDO and Silent Switcher regulators, clocking and multi-chip synchronisation, along with embedded digital and software technologies including algorithms and security.

The Apollo MxFE ecosystem includes a PLL/VCO synthesiser, the LTM4702 8A µModule regulator, a 10-channel precision synchroniser and companion TxVGA and RxVGA solutions.

http://www.analog.com

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Segger starts to add STOP to Embedded Studio for Arm

Protocol analyser extends PCI Express 6.0 protocol validation

0.25w InGaP HBT PAs are AEX-Q100-qualified

Apollo MxFE prepares for next-gen RF design

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