mcu News - CNX Software - Embedded Systems News

February 7, 2025February 7, 2025 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 1 Comment

Nuvoton introduces the first security chip based on OpenTitan open-source silicon Root of Trust

OpenTitan demo board Nuvoton open source security chip

Google has announced the start of the fabrication of a Nuvoton security chip featuring OpenTitan open-source silicon Root of Trust (RoT), the first such production-ready chip. It will soon be available in lowRISC’s Voyager 1 demo board, and later this year in Chromebooks and data centers. We first wrote about OpenTitan open-source Root of Trust (RoT) chips in 2020 as a collaboration between Google, Seagate, Nuvoton, Western Digital, lowRISC, as well as some other companies, projects, and universities that aimed at “building a transparent, high-quality reference design and integration guidelines for silicon root of trust (RoT) chips”. OpenTitan itself reached commercial availability last year, after the first engineering samples were released in 2023, and Google now says the Nuvoton chip (yet to have a proper name) is the first production-ready OpenTitan chip. Hardware Root of Trust (RoT) are small secure microcontrollers that are the equivalent of Certificate Authorities (CAs) to […]

January 28, 2025 by Debashis Das - No Comments

Infineon PSOC Control C3x real-time Cortex-M33 MCUs are designed for motor control and HVAC systems

infineon PSOC Control C3 MCU for for Motor Control and Power Conversion

Infineon recently launched the PSOC Control C3x family of Arm Cortex-M33 MCUs for real-time control applications in motor control and power conversion systems. The family includes 18 MCUs categorized into two lines, the Entry Line (C3P2, C3M3) and the Main Line (C3P5, C3M5). These MCUs can be used for various applications including home appliances, industrial drives, robots, light electric vehicles (LEVs), solar systems, and HVAC systems. The Entry Line operates at up to 100 MHz and supports a 12-bit SAR ADC with a sampling rate of up to 6 Msps, making it suitable for basic motor control and power conversion tasks. In contrast, the Main Line offers higher performance with up to 180 MHz operation, a faster 12-bit SAR ADC up to 12 Msps, and 4-channel High-Resolution PWM (HRPWM) for precise control. It also supports Wide Bandgap (WBG) switches for high-frequency power systems. Other features of this MCU include DSPs, FPUs, […]

January 27, 2025January 27, 2025 by Debashis Das - 6 Comments

NXP EdgeLock A30 Secure Authenticator chip enables battery authentication for compliance with EU regulation 2023/1542

NXP recently launched the EdgeLock A30 Secure Authenticator chip, a Common Criteria EAL 6+ certified secure authentication designed for IoT devices, including battery authentication applications. It complies with the EU’s Batteries Regulation 2023/1542, which mandates the inclusion of a Digital Product Passport (DPP), by 2027 to ensure traceability, sustainability, and safety in battery manufacturing and recycling. Alasdair Ross, Senior Director, NFC IoT Security, NXP explains: Secure authentication helps to ensure brand protection, consumer safety, and product traceability, fostering trust and shielding devices from physical damage. Smaller than a grain of rice, the EdgeLock A30 is designed to fit into even the smallest of devices. It supports multiple authentication use cases, making it easier for developers to support a variety of devices and accessories with a single solution, including device to device, cloud to device, counterfeit protection, and storage or protection of device identity. To address these requirements NXP’s EdgeLock A30 […]

January 27, 2025January 26, 2025 by Debashis Das - 5 Comments

STM32H7-powered open-source hardware 3D printer mainboard supports up to 6 stepper drivers

SmartPrintCoreH7x Open Source 3D Printer Mainboard

Designed by Boltz R&D, the SmartPrintCoreH7x 3D printer mainboard is an open-source mainboard built around an STM32H7 microcontroller and designed to work with 3D printers from Creality, Anet, and Voron. It supports up to 6 stepper drivers (5 standard drivers plus 1 dedicated driver) and can be expanded further using the “SmartPrintCore Extravaganza” module for additional stepper drivers. Key features of this motherboard include a jumper-less setup, automatic power source switching, and support for both 12V and 24V power supplies. It uses high-efficiency TI buck converters to provide power for multiple fan and servo ports, and there is a dedicated power supply for peripherals, SBCs, and Wi-Fi modules. The board is equipped with a variety of connectors, including Molex, Ultra-Fit, Mini-Lock, and JST-GH for power, motors, and peripherals. SmartPrintCoreH7x specifications: MCU – STMicro STM32H723 Arm Cortex-M7 32-bit core @ 550 MHz with 1MB Flash, 564 KB RAM, FPU, DSP, Ethernet, USB […]

January 17, 2025January 19, 2025 by Debashis Das - 3 Comments

Open hardware RP2350B boards offer up to 16MB flash, 8MB PSRAM, microSD card slot, 48x GPIOs

Olimex PICO2 XL and PICO2 XXL RP2350B Dev board

Olimex has recently released the PICO2-XL and PICO2-XXL open-source hardware RP2350B development boards with up to 16MB flash, 8MB PSRAM, 48 GPIOs, a microSD card slot, and more. The main difference between the two boards is that the PICO2-XL includes 2MB of external QSPI Flash and a compact flat-bottom design, making it ideal for simpler, space-constrained projects. In contrast, the PICO2-XXL offers 16MB of QSPI Flash, 8MB of PSRAM, and a microSD card slot for expanded storage and performance, catering to more demanding applications like IoT and edge computing. Olimex PICO2-XL and PICO2-XXL specifications SoC – Raspberry Pi RP2350B MCU CPU Dual-core Arm Cortex-M33 @150MHz with Arm Trustzone Dual-core 32-bit Hazard3 RISC-V @ 150MHz Up to two cores can be used at the same time Memory – 520KB SRAM 8kB OTP storage Security – Secure boot Package – QFN-80; 10×10 mm Memory – 8MB PSRAM (PICO2-XXL only) Storage PICO2-XL – […]

January 13, 2025January 11, 2025 by Tomisin Olujinmi - No Comments

NXP MCX L14x and MCX L25x ultra-low-power Cortex-M33 MCUs target energy harvesting and battery-powered devices

NXP Semiconductors has launched the MCX L series of ultra-low-power Arm Cortex-M33 MCUs with the MCX L14x and MCX L25x SKUs. The new series offers similar peripherals as the rest of the MCX portfolio but uses a new “power management architecture that supports always-on, battery-powered applications” The MCX L series uses a dual domain architecture, with “real-time processing and ultra-low-power sensing functions in a single device.” The Arm Cortex-M33 core supports real-time processing functions while the Arm Cortex-M0+ core offers always-on operation in the ultra-low-power sense domain. The new microcontrollers reportedly use three times less power than their predecessors. The ultra-low-power series is targeted at energy-constrained applications, powered by a battery, ultracapacitor, or power harvesting circuit. These include building control, industrial sensing, smoke and fire alarms, flow meters, smart appliances, and motion detectors. NXP MCX L14x and L25x specifications: CPU Main core: Arm Cortex-M33 microcontroller @ up to 96 MHz […]

January 13, 2025January 13, 2025 by Debashis Das - 3 Comments

Seeed Studio XIAO Plus series adds more GPIOs through castellated holes

In response to community feedback for more I/O options, Seeed Studio has recently launched the Seeed Studio XIAO Plus series with 23 castellated mounting pins (20 GPIOs, 3 power pins) and improved back solder points, improving compatibility with carrier boards for complex projects. The new series includes the XIAO ESP32S3 Plus, XIAO nRF52840 Plus, and XIAO nRF52840 Sense Plus which are direct upgrades of the XIAO ESP32S3, XIAO nRF52840 BLE, and XIAO nRF52840 Sense boards. The new design allows for easier assembly and scalable production, with double the I/O options. XIAO ESP32S3 Plus The Seeed Studio XIAO ESP32S3 Plus is a compact development board with a total of 23 pins on the board out of which 11 are through-hole GPIO pins 9 additional SMD castellations GPIO pins and 3 through-hole are power pins. The board is built around an ESP32-S3 MCU so it has 2.4GHz WiFi and BLE 5.0 connectivity. Other […]

January 7, 2025January 6, 2025 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 4 Comments

FOSDEM 2025 schedule – Embedded, Open Hardware, RISC-V, Edge AI, and more

FOSDEM 2025 will take place on February 1-2 with over 8000 developers meeting in Brussels to discuss open-source software & hardware projects. The free-to-attend (and participate) “Free and Open Source Software Developers’ European Meeting” grows every year, and in 2025 there will be 968 speakers, 930 events, and 74 tracks. Like every year since FOSDEM 2015 which had (only) 551 events, I’ll create a virtual schedule with sessions most relevant to the topics covered on CNX Software from the “Embedded, Mobile and Automotive” and “Open Hardware and CAD/CAM” devrooms, but also other devrooms including “RISC-V”, “FOSS Mobile Devices”, “Low-level AI Engineering and Hacking”, among others. FOSDEM 2025 Day 1 – Saturday 1 10:30 – 11:10 – RISC-V Hardware – Where are we? by Emil Renner Berthing I’ll talk about the current landscape of available RISC-V hardware powerful enough to run Linux and hopefully give a better overview of what to […]