Problem hits Freescale Kinetis K60 family

By Nick Flaherty www.flaherty.co.uk

Development tool vendor IAR is warning that users can accidently, and permanently, lock up Freescale's Kinetis K60 microcontroller family. Chris Hills, Technical Director of Paedrus Systems, points to the IAR advisory note and says that a problem could be caused if the default linker configuration file was used and the code reached address 0x40C as Freescale have used that address for the NVFSEC register. Within the register two bits control the mass erase function and two more control flash security. If they are used in conjunction then the device can permanently and irreversibly lock, says Hills. With the KickStart Kit, the default linker configuration file is "generic_cortex.icf", which ignores the Freescale idiosyncrasy. The kit also includes a device-specific file, K60X_Flash.icf, which can easily be selected, so it's only something that would happen by accident.

Related articles

• Freescale unveils basestation on a chip (zdnet.com)
• Freescale files to raise $1.15 billion in IPO (marketwatch.com)
• Freescale Becomes Latest Private Equity-Backed IPO (blogs.wsj.com)

ARM's Broadcom deal is bigger than Microsoft

BROADCOM AND ARM EXTEND RELATIONSHIP WITH STRATEGIC LICENSING AGREEMENT

By Nick Flaherty www.flaherty.co.uk

Broadcom has taken a broad license to all ARM's processor cores in a move that is fundamentally more important for the embedded market than the recent Microsoft announcement.

Broadcom now has access the entire range of ARM processors, from the smallest, lowest-power ARM CortexTM-M0 processor, through to the newly introduced, high-performance Cortex-A15 application processor and beyond. As Broadcom is pushing the system-on-chip approach strongly into the embedded market, this will see a lot more 32bit ARM cores in designs that traditionally used 16bit processors, as well as high end smartphone chips to take on Qualcomm and in highly integrated networking devices.
As part of the agreement Broadcom has access to both current and future ARM processors to use across product lines. This includes the Cortex-A15 processor for use in high performance mobile and networking applications, the specialized security hardened SC000 processor core for security applications, and the newly announced Cortex-R5 and Cortex-R7 processors for high performance real-time applications.
“ARM’s wide portfolio of cores enhances Broadcom’s strategy of designing cost- optimized high performance solutions for a wide range of applications from Bluetooth headsets to high-end application processors for tablets,” said Scott McGregor, President and CEO of Broadcom. “Broadcom and ARM have already established a successful partnership in smartphones and other exciting mobile devices. Today’s agreement will help expand that success into many new and exciting high-growth opportunities.”
 “The growing partnership with Broadcom brings new opportunities” said Warren East, CEO, ARM. “Broadcom’s strength across diverse markets and their expertise in highly integrated systems brings a breadth of knowledge to the ARM Partnership. Our expanded relationship shows the universal benefits that scalable, low-power ARM IP can bring to market leading solutions across a wide range of end devices and equipment.”

Related articles

• Broadcom announces yet another Android-friendly dual-core processor (engadget.com)
• Broadcom Enters the Dual Core Mobile Chip Wars (gigaom.com)
• Broadcom's new BCM21654 baseband processor for Android debuts (slashgear.com)
• Broadcom intros dual-core 1.1GHz ARM chip with 1080p video (electronista.com)

Toumaz launches ultra-low power self-powered radio chip

1V ‘TELRAN’ TZ1053 aimed at wireless sensor networks, environmental monitoring and smart metering in the sub-1GHz ISM band

By Nick Flaherty www.flaherty.co.uk

Toumaz Technology has launched an ultra-low power radio chip aimed at wireless sensors in environmental and medical systems that can use solar or energy harvesting systems and so be self-powered. The chip can be used both for the sensor and in the hub that collects the data.

Toumaz has rejected using existing standards such as Zigbee and Low Energy Bluetooth and developed its own protocol to provide continuous power of under 3mW in the Industrial, Scientific and Medical bands under 1GHz .

"Bluetooth at 2.4GHz suffers from interference from Wifi and microwaves while we do not need the mesh capabilities of Zigbee and the ISM band gives us more range" said Paul Paddan, Head of Toumaz’s Low Power Radio Business Unit.  

Padden had already developed ultra low power systems for Toumaz' Sensium wireless 'plasters' that are undergoing clinical trials, and is extending the design ideas to other  industrial and medical areas.

The system-on-chip is built on Toumaz’s proprietary AMx Mixed Signal technology and includes an 8051 processor to make it easy to use and runs at 1V using a single button cell battery and consumes less than 3mW continuous use power consumption. "This is the worst case performance and with a duty cycle it is considerably better," said Padden.

“With this important addition to our ‘Connected Consumer’ portfolio, we are harnessing our strengths in ultra-low energy wireless healthcare to create solutions for high-volume consumer markets," said Professor Chris Toumazou, founder of Toumaz and now CEO after the departure of co-founder Keith errery. "TELRAN is uniquely placed to support the development of a range of new ultra-low energy wireless applications, and we are very excited by the product opportunities that we will be enabling for our customers with today’s launch.”
The TELRAN contains an enhanced 8051 running Toumaz’s Nanopower Sensor Protocol (NSP) allowing developers to program and control the TELRAN device easily with high level commands either over a standard interface eg UART or “over the air”. Target applications include the development of two-way communication remote controls for consumer electronic devices; wireless sensor networks based on TELRAN sensor nodes and basestations; environment monitoring and room temperature control; remote controls and toys/games; and smart metering, using TELRAN wireless sensor networks to connect multiple meters for the two-way transmission of status data and firmware upgrades.

Highlight features of the TELRAN IC include:

• Fully integrated SoC comprising transceiver, baseband, embedded microprocessor and control logic
• Ease of development – no compilers or specialist programming investment required
• Simple over-the-air programming and reconfiguration
• Quick and efficient customisation using application profiles
• Support for networking and communication modes including P2P (Point to Point), star network (up to 8 sensor nodes) and basestation-to-basestation communication
• Data rate of 50 kbps with a range greater than 100m line of sight using a high gain antenna, or 20m from a PCB or chip antenna in a body-worn environment.
• Ability to directly connect SPI/I2C sensors

TELRAN TZ1053 devices will be available worldwide as engineering samples from the end of February 2011, with production devices in full availability from June 2011. A TELRAN developer kit will also be available at the end of February. The TELRAN Development Kit (TDK) includes a USB TELRAN basestation, TELRAN RF module and an accelerometer sensor board with demo and PC application. The TELRAN RF module (TZ1053RFM) is also available to customers for fast prototyping and production.

Related articles

• DNA Electronics announces grants of key international patents (your-story.org)
• Building Wireless Sensor Networks (O'Reilly) (i-programmer.info)
• Wearable wireless device monitors health of record-breaking transantarctic expedition team (gizmag.com)
• Bluetooth low energy should contribute to WSN via remote monitoring(pradeepchakraborty.wordpress.com)

Conexant sold off to SMSC

Creates group with 900 mixed signal engineers
By Nick Flaherty www.flaherty.co.uk

How are the mighty fallen. The once powerful embedded chip maker Conexant Systems - spin off of Rockwell and dominant supplier of modem chips - is to be sold off to up and coming chip maker SMSC of New York.
Conexant leaves the industry with a string of legacies through a number of spin offs, from foundry Jazz to telecom chip maker MindSpeed, but the core of chips for imaging, audio, embedded modem, and video surveillance applications will go to to SMSC in a deal valued at approximately $284 million including the assumption of Conexant’s net debt. The transaction has been approved by the boards of directors of both companies.
The company had been selling off parts of the business for several years, and last month sold property next to its Newport Beach, California, headquarters for $23m

Combined Company Highlights:

• Creates a stronger analogue/mixed-signal R&D team with over 900 engineers globally,
• Complementary connectivity product portfolios to target more expansive set of computing, consumer, industrial and automotive applications,
• Serves key customers with more complete product solutions,
• Combined company has the scale and resources to enhance SMSC’s finances with a combined revenue of $632m,
• Anticipated cost cutting of $8 to $10m by the end of SMSC’s fourth quarter

The combination of Conexant’s imaging, audio, embedded modem and video products with SMSC’s broad connectivity solutions targeting the computing, consumer, industrial and automotive markets provides for a highly complementary merger of talent and technology. Conexant has approximately 600 employees worldwide, including over 230 in Asia.
“We believe that combining the growth potential of Conexant and SMSC will allow us to leverage complementary technology and engineering resources to provide our customers with expanded solutions in connectivity and content,” said Christine King, President & Chief Executive Officer of SMSC. “We plan to focus our resources on the areas of highest return and believe that our respective sales and supply chain relationships will help create a platform to grow our businesses. In addition, we expect to capture significant operating efficiencies that will position us to increase earnings growth. SMSC’s larger scale should position us to increase our R&D productivity and drive profitability and shareholder value.”
“In our industry, size and scope provide a significant advantage with customers and suppliers," said Scott Mercer, Conexant's Chairman and Chief Executive Officer. "SMSC and Conexant share similar core competencies in analog and mixed-signal design, possess complementary product portfolios, and count many customers in common. By joining forces, we get the opportunity to take advantage of economies of scale and drive profitable growth."
Sailesh Chittipeddi, currently President & Chief Operating Officer at Conexant, will join SMSC upon close of the acquisition as Executive Vice President, reporting to Christine King. Mr. Chittipeddi’s responsibilities will include all product lines and global marketing and engineering functions for SMSC.

IPv6 provides path to secure deployment of next-generation Internet - uptake data

By Nick Flaherty www.flaherty.co.uk

Researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have issued a guide for managers, network engineers, transition teams and others to help them deploy the next generation Internet Protocol (IPv6) securely.

This is vital for the next generation of embedded devices as it provides a wider range of addresses and more security, but uptake has been slow - see graph

You can also go to http://v6asns.ripe.net/ and choose the list of countries you are interested in for the uptake data updated regularly.

Guidelines for the Secure Deployment of IPv6 (NIST Special Publication 800-119), describes the features of IPv6 and the possible related security impacts, provides a comprehensive survey of mechanisms to deploy IPv6 and suggests a deployment strategy for a secure IPv6 environment.
The ballooning popularity of devices, such as smart phones and netbooks, tied to the Internet is rapidly depleting the number of so-called IP addresses available under the current Internet Protocol version 4 (IPv4), so the networkers of the world are preparing to move to the next generation, IPv6. Among other improvements, IPv6 has a vastly greater number of potential addresses—several billion per each of the world's current population of about 6.9 billion people.
To ensure that the US government is prepared for IPv6, the Office of Management and Budget has mandated federal agencies to begin deploying the new protocol. NIST developed the IPv6 security guidelines in support of the Federal Information Security Management Act (FISMA). The publication is designed to help federal agencies avoid possible security risks that could occur during IPv6 deployment. It also could be useful for the private sector and other organizations.
"The Internet protocol pervades every aspect of computer communications," explains lead author Sheila Frankel, "so deploying IPv6 is a major task." With detailed planning, she says, organizations can navigate the process smoothly and securely. Most organizations will be operating IPv6 and IPv4 concurrently.
"Security will be a challenge, however, because organizations will be running two protocols and that increases complexity, which in turn increases security challenges," Frankel says. SP 800-119 describes the security challenges organizations may face as they deploy IPv6. Those challenges include fending off attackers that have more experience than an organization in the early stages of IPv6 deployment and the difficulty of detecting unknown or unauthorized IPv6 assets on existing IPv4 production networks. The publication provides information to be considered during the deployment planning process and makes recommendations to mitigate IPv6 threats.

Related articles

• US Government Releases Two IPv6 Papers (circleid.com)
• Guidelines for Secure IPv6 (flyingpenguin.com)
• Rackspace is Gearing Up for IPv6 (rackspacecloud.com)
• Uptake of IPv6 in All Regions (circleid.com)

Qualcomm's acquisition of Atheros key to Connected Home says iSuppli

Key to combat Broadcom 

By Nick Flaherty www.flaherty.co.uk

Qualcomm’s planned acquisition of Atheros Communications will position the combined companies to take on rival Broadcom in the burgeoning consumer electronics market for wireless connectivity semiconductors, according to market researchers iSuppli.
Qualcomm today confirmed it will buy Atheros in a deal estimated to be worth about $3.1 billion. Qualcomm is the world’s largest supplier of semiconductors for wireless products, accounting for an estimated 22.4 percent of global wireless semiconductor market revenue in the fourth quarter of 2010. Atheros ranks 12th in the market with an estimated share of 2.2 percent.

“With Atheros adding only 2.2 percentage points to Qualcomm’s portion of the wireless market, this acquisition is clearly not a market share play for Qualcomm. Rather, it’s a pure strategic play, designed to bolster its position in the fast-growing wireless connectivity space now dominated by Broadcom,” said Francis Sideco, principal analyst, wireless communications for iSuppli.
Atheros’ main allure is its global leadership in low-power semiconductor solutions that support the 802.11n high-throughput wireless local area network (WLAN) standard, a type of Wi-Fi technology suitable for the transfer of bandwidth-intensive data such as video.
After several quarters of effort, Atheros has experienced limited success selling its 802.11n semiconductors in the cell phone market. iSuppli’s Teardown Analysis service has identified Atheros chips in smart phones such as Samsung’s Galaxy 5 and Sony Ericsson’s XPERIA X10. But the company has enjoyed greater success in non-cell-phone products, with design wins in products including Apple’s iMac line, Hewlett-Packard’s Pavilion PC family, Acer’s Aspire PC line, the third-generation Amazon Kindle and Microsoft’s Zune MP3 player. Furthermore, Atheros has achieved strong design wins in home networking routers, positioning it for success in the connected home segment.
“While Qualcomm already has its own Wi-Fi technology, this deal bolsters its design capabilities and opens up more opportunities in non-handset devices such as tablets and consumer electronics devices, particularly those in the connected home,” Sideco said.
Broadcom currently dominates the market for wireless connectivity semiconductors for consumer electronics, the so-called connected home area. This represents a booming segment of the wireless semiconductor business, with shipments of video-oriented consumer electronics devices equipped with high-bandwidth wireless solutions expected to grow to more than 85.2 million units by 2014, up from 606,000 units in 2009.
“Connectivity has arrived on the consumer electronics market in a big way—and no semiconductor supplier can seriously tackle this market without extensive system-on-chip (SOC) design capabilities, including a vast portfolio of intellectual property,” said Lee Ratliff, senior analyst, broadband and digital home, for iSuppli. “Broadcom is the gold standard in this area—the king of the SOC solution. With the acquisition of the Atheros portfolio, Qualcomm now is better positioned to offer SOCs that can compete with Broadcom’s offerings for a slice of the connected consumer electronics market.”
Ratliff noted that Qualcomm is not alone in its efforts to position itself against Broadcom in this critical area. Other semiconductor suppliers eying the connected home market include Marvell Technology, Ralink Technology and Zoran.
Some of the most attractive opportunities for connected home products are televisions and set-top boxes.
The acquisition of Atheros’ technology also could help Qualcomm to simultaneously defend against and attack Broadcom in its core business in cell phone semiconductors.
“Broadcom has enjoyed major success with its connectivity solutions in cell phones, most notably the main WLAN slot in the iPhone,” Sideco observed. “iSuppli believes it is only a matter of time before an EvDO and/or LTE iPhone will be introduced. It is essential that Qualcomm be part of the baseband picture for those types of phones due to its virtual lock on the EvDO market. Because of this, the company could be trying to expand its footprint by winning this slot from Broadcom.”
Meanwhile, the Atheros acquisition will help Qualcomm address the fast-growing market for tablets.
“Only some tablets will have the kind of 3G or 4G connectivity that requires Qualcomm’s silicon,” Sideco said. “However, all tablets will have the kind of Wi-Fi capabilities that can be supported by Atheros. This acquisition will ensure that Qualcomm has an opportunity to sell its chips into all tablets, whether they are 3G, 4G or Wi-Fi/Bluetooth.”

Related articles

• Qualcomm's $3.1 billion purchase of Atheros a jump onto Wi-Fi wagon (seattletimes.nwsource.com)
• Qualcomm-Atheros Early Reads: A 'Natural Fit' (blogs.wsj.com)
• Qualcomm buy Atheros in $3.1bn Ubiquitous Connectivity deal (slashgear.com)

Embedded market research consolidation continues as NPD buys In-Stat

By Nick Flaherty www.flaherty.co.uk


Market research is an important tool in the development of embedded systems, and the firms that provide such data are seeing a key consolidation into just two large and relatively unknown conglomerates. This has happened before, with the Gartner Group taking over Dataquest in 1995, with the resulting loss of key semiconductor research and loss of confidence in the quality of the data and understanding of the embedded industry.
Now the NPD group is taking over In-Stat, joining it with screen hardware data supplier DisplayScreen purchased in 2005. “In-Stat will be a strategic addition to the NPD family of analyst businesses,” said Tim Bush, General Manager of The NPD Group’s Analyst Services, into which In-Stat will report. “By combining information and services from DisplaySearch and In-Stat, we will be able to offer the industry a complete view of the digital world, including analysis of how digital content is affecting the evolving hardware market.” 
Mark Kirstein, CEO of In-Stat sees it positively of course: “We are delighted to become a part of The NPD Group family. As part of The NPD Group’s Analyst Services we will be better able to serve our clients on a global basis, as well as leverage NPD’s complementary market information and scale.”
This mirrors the recent deals by IHS taking over supply chain researchers iSuppli and screen content data supplier Screen Digest last year.
IHS and NPD are relatively unknown in the embedded industry, unlike iSuppli, In-Stat, Screen Digest and DisplayScreen, and while all the organisations are keeping their own identity at the moment, the tendency, as shown by Gartner, is to combine them into a wider group.  
NPD supplies data to a bewildering selection of industries, including automotive, beauty, commercial technology, consumer technology, entertainment, fashion, food and beverage, foodservice, home, office supplies, software, sports, toys, and wireless. The specialist electronics skills of In-Stat are likely to become lost in this wide range, which would be a great shame.

Related articles

• The NPD Group Forms Strategic Alliance With In-Stat (eon.businesswire.com)
• The NPD Group Acquires Leading Solar Energy Market Research Firm, Solarbuzz LLC (eon.businesswire.com)
• NPD Takes a Look at Top Sellers That Could Find Their Way onto Holiday Shopping Lists (prweb.com)

USB3.0 drives the 'zero client' computer with no internal processing power - CES

New Approach to Computing Powered by USB 3.0 at CES 2011

By Nick Flaherty www.flaherty.co.uk

The rise of the high speed USB3.0 technology, particularly the optical version, is leading to a renaissance in the thin client, driving the idea of the 'zero client', says VIA Labs.

The Zero Client concept is an evolution of the Thin Client computing model that takes Shared-Resource Computing to the next level with no independent hardware processing facilities. Through multiple zero clients, many users can be simultaneously connected to a single server, leveraging the abundant computing power and flexibility provided by today’s mainstream systems. In contemporary zero client implementations, the end user experience is often bandwidth dependant since each Zero Client requires video, audio, and data connections.
Before the speed and flexibility of USB 3.0, Zero Clients utilized USB 2.0 or Ethernet, and frequently offered inferior multimedia capabilities and a degraded user experience. VIA Labs is demonstrating a zero client based on the new USB 3.0 standard which offers massive bandwidth capacity with its portfolio of USB 3.0 Superspeed controllers where several client terminals can now simultaneously enjoy a full user experience including HD multimedia, using the optical version to get the distance to the terminal previously provided by Ethernet.
“The zero client concept exemplifies the benefits that higher bandwidth USB 3.0 technologies can offer,” said Gibson Chen, Vice President of Sales at VIA Labs. “USB 3.0 based zero clients can enjoy a full and immersive PC experience simultaneously across several client stations thanks to the far greater data throughput that our leading USB 3.0 controllers offer.”
VIA labs is the only company in the world to have a complete USB 3.0 solution with host, hub and device controller products that are quickly setting industry standards. With an emphasis on delivering leading bandwidth performance while also pursing aggressive power-savings, VIA Labs is paving the way forward for new applications and devices in the broader electronics industry.

Complying with USB 3.0, USB Battery Charging, and eXtensible Host Controller Interface specifications (xHCI) the VIA VL800 offers four downstream facing ports that enable the simultaneous operation of multiple peripheral devices and includes USB Battery charging support to rapidly charge smart phones, tablets, and other compatible devices.
The industry’s first USB 3.0 hub controller, the VIA VL810 is a highly integrated, single chip solution provides maximum data transfer rates of up to 5Gbps, or ten times the throughput available to USB 2.0 based devices. Enables up to four USB devices to be connected to a single downstream port of a host or hub.
The VIA VL700 USB 3.0 to SATA Controller is a highly integrated single chip solution that allows users to connect any SATA hard disk drive (HDD), solid state drive (SSD), and optical disc drive (ODD) devices to their PC over USB 3.0. Details can be found here: http://www.via-labs.com/en/products/vl700/index.jsp
The VIA VL750 USB 3.0 to NAND Flash Controller is the first of its kind in the world, featuring a 4-channel memory controller with interleaving support, the VIA VL750 offers consumers blisteringly fast data transfer speeds of 100MB/s or more on larger capacity ‘thumb’ drives and USB sticks.

Related articles
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USB 3.0: Everything You Need to Know (itexpertvoice.com)
You: Intel Confirms USB 3.0 on Chief River Notebook Platform (everythingusb.com)
USB-IF Announces Second Certified USB 3.0 Host Controller (eon.businesswire.com)
USB 3.0 Support in Windows 7 (devcurry.com)

VIA Launches Embedded Industry’s First Dedicated Graphics Card with 3D and DDR3

By Nick Flaherty www.flaherty.co.uk

VIA eH1 card offers DX10.1 graphics and multi-screen HD video content for embedded systems

 VIA Technologies has developed a graphics card designed specifically for the embedded market. The eH1 is a DX10.1 compliant, multi-display card for the PCI Express slot that comes with the three year product longevity guarantee that is vital for embedded designs and is the most power-efficient discrete graphics and video solution on the market today. The VIA eH1 AIB uses the 64bit S3 Chrome 5400E GPU graphics chip for DirectX 10.1, OpenGL 3.1, OpenGL ES 2.0  and offers multi-stream 1080p HD video decoding and Stereoscopic 3D rendering capability alongside 512Mbytes of DDR3 memory. This makes it the ideal solution for a range of embedded applications that require advanced graphics and video on multiple displays.

 “The VIA eH1 hits a real sweet spot for the embedded industry as a whole,” said Daniel Wu, Vice President, VIA Embedded Platform Division at VIA Technologies. “Offering technologies like DX10.1, OpenGL/CL, plus multi-channel HD video playback on an extremely low power AIB will excite system integrators who want to bring the latest features to existing platforms.”

VIA eH1: Embedded Graphics and Video

The VIA eH1 is a low profile PCI Express add-in-board designed for next generation embedded applications in a range of segments including digital signage and advertising, POS, POI, gaming or any embedded application where graphics and HD video is streamed on two displays.

l            PCIe 2.0 Bus Interface

l            512MB DDR3

l            Low profile form factor

l            Dual-Link DVI and HDMI (with HDCP)

l            Fully programmable DirectX 10.1 Unified Shader Core

l            OpenGL 3.1 + OpenGL ES 2.0

l            GPGPU on OpenCL 1.0

l            H.264 and VC-1 support for Blu-Ray

l            Support for resolutions up to 2560x1600

l            1080p/1080i/720p HD-decode

l            Steroscopic 3D capable

l            Dual display support

The VIA eH1 can be used in conjunction with a number of VIA EPIA board products and can supplement any existing system that uses a x1, x4, x8 or x16 PCIe slot. Samples of the VIA eH1 are available now to project customers upon request.

Details regarding the S3 Chrome 5400E can be found at S3 Graphics

Related articles

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• Sigma Designs Announces New 3D Graphics-Enabled Media Processor and Celrun Set-Top Box Design Win (eon.businesswire.com)
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Five reasons why we won't see IBM's holographic display in five years - video

By Nick Flaherty www.flaherty.co.uk

IBM has released its prediction of five key technologies for the next five years, and on the whole they are pretty sound: fuel cell batteries are here and making headway in a number of markets, the smart grid will take existing technologies and apply them to wide area power systems, sensors will be everywhere (absolutely!) and smart algorithms can take the pain out of commuting - so far, so good. But the one that IBM has chosen to headline is holographic phone calls (and mobile ones at that).

IBM says:

In the next five years, 3-D interfaces – like those in the movies – will let you interact with 3-D holograms of your friends in real time. Movies and TVs are already moving to 3-D, and as 3-D and holographic cameras get more sophisticated and miniaturized to fit into cell phones, you will be able to interact with photos, browse the Web and chat with your friends in entirely new ways.

Scientists are working to improve video chat to become holography chat - or "3-D telepresence." The technique uses light beams scattered from objects and reconstructs a picture of that object, a similar technique to the one human eyes use to visualize our surroundings.

This is nonsense for a number of reasons:

1. Photonics doesn't scale. We haven't been able to make photonics scale like silicon - researchers have been trying for 20 years to make the photonic computer, and are still trying. It will take more than 5 years to make commercial, large scale photonic technology small enough for the home, let alone the mobile
2. Photonics won't be cheap enough. As it doesn't scale, it's also going to be hard to make it cheap enough. There are LED projectors now but there's some large steps to take to make this a consumer product
3. It's too power hungry for mobile. And not low cost enough. Or small enough. It won't make the home, let alone the mobile.
4. Video calling is only just taking off. It has taken 20 years for the idea of 2D video calling to take off. A lack of standards and a social resistance is only just being overcome with Skype in the office (not in the living room even now) and Facetime on the Apple 4. There is still a lot of resistance to installing a projector in the home that will take a lot to overcome. 
5. It's the face, stupid. Apple is driving video calling through the face - being able to see the other person's expression. That's not what the 3D system provides. 

That's not to say it won't be incredibly useful, just not in the home. The key is that the engineers at IBM Research are working on new ways to visualize 3-D data, working on technology that would allow engineers to step inside designs of everything from buildings to software programs, running simulations of how diseases spread across interactive 3-D globes, and visualizing trends happening around the world on Twitter – all in real time and with little to no distortion. 

This is where the technology will take off, where size, cost and power are less important than visualising large amounts of data. From there it make its way into the home office with new projectors, but this will take more than five years to happen.


Related articles

• Survey says 3D holographic FaceTime and air-powered batteries by 2015 (geek.com) 
• IBM predictions for 2015: Holographic cell phones (blogs.consumerreports.org) 
• IBM Expects to See Holographic Phone Calls, Air-Powered Batteries by 2015 (textually.org) 
• IBM dreams of holographic conversations, air-charged batteries for mobile phones (intomobile.com) 
• IBM Projects Holographic Phones, Air-Driven Batteries (tech.slashdot.org) 
• IBM predicts holographic calls, breathing batteries (news.cnet.com) 

World's smallest Christmas card in nanotech

By Nick Flaherty www.flaherty.co.uk

Researchers at the University of Glasgow have built what they claim is the world's smallest Christmas card etched on a piece of glass.

"We decided that producing this Christmas card was a simple way to show just how accurate our technology is," said Professor David Cumming of the School of Engineering. "The process to manufacture the card only took 30 minutes. It was very straightforward to produce as the process is highly repeatable – the design of the card took far longer than the production of the card itself.

"The card is 200 micro-metres wide by 290 micro-metres tall. To put that into some sort of perspective, a micro-metre is a millionth of a metre; the width of a human hair is about 100 micro-metres. You could fit over half a million of them onto a standard A5 Christmas card – but signing them would prove to be a bit of a challenge."

The process used was plasmon resonance in a patterned aluminium film made in the University's James Watt Nanofabrication Centre.

EU project to build a molecular computer

Nottingham University part of collaboration
By Nick Flaherty www.flaherty.co.uk


The University of Nottingham is the UK's representative in a major new European project to build a computer that uses molecules as switches rather than transistors.
The four year AtMol project stats on the 1st January with ten research groups in Europe working together with the IMRE Institute from A*A*STAR inSingapore on atomic scale technologies, new quantum architectures with multi-scale interconnection and packaging techniques for a single molecule to compute and be packaged into a molecular chip.
However, the research builds the devices individually, and mass production will be needed to make molecular computers a reality.
AtMol had already established a detail process flow for fabricating  the molecular chip with a single calculating molecule unit connected  via external nano-electrodes to preserve its integrity down to the atomic level  even  after  its encapsulation.  On a surface,  the  required  logic functions  are embedded in a single molecule but can also be implanted within an atomic scale circuit. AtMol will explore and demonstrate how the combination of classical and quantum  information inside the same atomic scale circuit increases the computing power of the final  intramolecular logic circuit.
Atomic scale logics will be constructed using atom-by-atom manipulation, on-surface chemistry, and lab tested using a unique UHV transfer printing technology.
The AtMol research needs state-of-the-art UHV atomic scale interconnection machines comprising, a UHV surface preparation chamber, a UHV transfer printing device, an LTUHV-STM (or a UHV-NC-AFM) for atomic scale construction, a FIM atomic scale tip fabrication device and a multi-probe system with its companion SEM or optical navigation microscope. At the starting of AtMol, only three of such machines exist worldwide and they are each housed within  AtMol laboratories  (Toulouse, Krakow and Singapore).  They will be used  to interconnect molecule logic gates one-by-one in a planar atomic scale multi-pad approach on the top, atomically reconstructed, surface of the wafer. For this molecular chip, the back face of the wafer will incorporate nano-to-micro-scale interconnections using nanofabricated vias. The  AtMol patented  hybrid micro-nano back interconnect approach will enable the full packaging of the molecular chip preserving the surface atomic scale precision of the design.

The AtMol partners are dominated by centres in Germany and Spain, as well as the state-funded French research institutes:

• CEMES-CNRS (Toulouse, France), 
• LETI-CEA (Grenoble, France),  
• Phantoms Foundation (Madrid, Spain), 
• ICIQ (Tarragona, Spain), 
• CSIC (Barcelona, Spain), 
• Fritz Haber Institute (Berlin, Germany), 
• Humboldt University (Berlin, Germany), 
• Dresden Technical University (Dresden, Germany), 
• Nottingham University (Nottingham, UK),  
• Jagiellonian University (Krakow, Poland), 
• IMRE A*STAR (Singapore)

Related articles

• EU funds the ICT-FET Integrated Project AtMol to explore Atomic scale and single Molecule logic gate technologies (nanotech-now.com)
• New project launched: Atomic Scale and Single Molecule Logic Gate Technologies (metamodern.com)
• A Computer Chip the Size of a Molecule (neatorama.com)
• Project launched to create and test a molecular-sized processor chip (foresight.org)
• Singapore’s A*STAR participates in groundbreaking European Union (EU) project to jointly create a processor that is the size of a molecule (nanotech-now.com)

First video of working invisibility cloak

R&D project demonstration

By Nick Flaherty www.flaherty.co.uk

A video by Fractal Antenna Systems of Waltham, Massachusets (just down the road from Analog Devices) is showing that the 'invisibility cloak' is becoming a realistic project.
The company has been working on the system for two years using fractal antennas and resonators to make an 'object', or wearer, disappear into the background.
"The invisibility cloak we have has unique characteristics that have not been achieved by others, because others have not used our fractal approach," said Nathan Cohen, CEO at Fractal Antenna Systems. "Our invisibility cloak DOES allow the object to look to the outside, is wideband, and has minimal shadow and scattering. There is NO mirror of any kind. And there is no power needed to make it work. So we meet that heady requirement of making something slip into the background but also let that something ‘see out’ at the same time. This is exactly what the world sees as exciting about invisibility cloak research. Not new attempts at fun-house mirrors.”
The firm's approach was first reported in March 2009 and since then key measurements of scattering, reproducibility, bandwidth and fidelity, as well as ability to 'see-out' have been quantified on the fractal invisibility cloak, which operates at a wide range of microwave frequencies, including those used by cell phones.
"We have an invisibility cloak, wideband at microwaves, you can see out of and melds into the background. We made careful measurements of the invisibility cloak against controls for a comparison, as any thorough experiment requires. The results are compelling and irrefutable," said Cohen, mentioning that the results will be published and that the fractal invisibility cloak is an R&D device, not a practical application. “I am not going around wearing one to hide from microwaves, but this does show that it is feasible. It also shows a path to visual light versions, which have more serious fabrication challenges than the longer wavelength microwaves. I’d give Harry Potter 30 more years of waiting for a visual light invisibility cloak. But at least, from a technology standpoint, he can now put the order in.”

Top five postings on The Embedded Blog

By Nick Flaherty www.flaherty.co.uk

As we approach the end of the year, it's time to look back on what have been the most popular stories on The Embedded Blog in 2010.

1. True gesture multitouch for large LCDs
2. Open Android API to drive NFC 
3. TI's 1GHz Cortex A8
4. The battle of names with iPad and iNemo
5. USB3 moving into digital cameras

But there has to be a mention of a story from 2009 that is still in the chart this year, with Atmel's 34cent RFID chip.

Happy New Year!

Related articles

• NFC embedded in Google's Nexus S (flyingpenguin.com)
• 100 Uses for RFID (q-ontech.blogspot.com)
• Embedded RFID for online passwords (hackaday.com)

Nottingham researchers etch the periodic table on a hair - video

By Nick Flaherty www.flaherty.co.uk


Not strictly an embedded story but great nonetheless - researchers at the Nottingham Nanotechnology and Nanoscience Center have etched a tiny periodic table onto a hair belonging to chemistry Professor Martyn Poliakoff. This is part of their collection of Periodic tables at  The Periodoc Table of Videos.



  

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• Is the Periodic Table Wrong? (foxnews.com)

Moving multicore to embedded is key to US competitiveness

By Nick Flaherty www.flaherty.co.uk

The rapid advances in information technology that drive many sectors of the US economy could stall unless there is significant fundamental research and development of parallel computing, says a new report by the National Research Council -- which will drive the move to embedded multicore systems.

Better options for managing power consumption in computers will also be essential for continued improvements in IT performance.

Advances in single-processor, sequential computer microprocessors have enabled computing performance to increase dramatically -- on the order of 10,000 times in the last 20 years but power management and other technological limitations have made it impractical to continue improving computer performance in this way much longer. Parallel computing, therefore, is the only known alternative for improving computer performance without significantly increasing costs and energy usage, the report says.
"The societal and economic impact of computer technology is undeniable, increasing productivity and efficiency and fostering innovation in medicine, defense, entertainment, and communications," said Samuel Fuller, chief technology officer and vice president of research and development for Analog Devices and chair of the committee that wrote the report. "To ensure that computing systems continue to double in performance every few years, we need to make significant changes in computer software and hardware. Investing in research and development of parallel computing offers a clear path forward."
Despite some mainstream successes in parallel computing -- such as the MapReduce programming framework used by Google to process large data sets using thousands of computers -- most parallel computing in use now is limited to comparatively narrow scientific and engineering applications. To enable parallel computing for broader use, new algorithms, programming models, operating systems, and computer architectures will be required, the report says, and research and development in these areas should be pursued.
In particular, advances are necessary to develop new parallel programming methods and supporting computing systems. Although computing hardware such as semiconductor chips that contain eight or more microprocessors have already been developed, software that can keep that many or more processors busy in parallel is not available for most computing applications.
Research and development should also focus on making computer systems more energy efficient, the report says. Power constraints now affect systems ranging from handheld devices to the largest computing data centres. Most computer chips are designed with silicon-based complementary metal oxide semiconductor (CMOS) technology. While the number of devices per CMOS chip continues to double every few years, the technology has essentially reached its limits with regard to power efficiency. Even as new parallel computing models and solutions are found, most future performance will ultimately be limited by energy constraints, the report notes.
It cautions that while parallel computing is the best alternative for improving future performance, there is no guarantee that it will bring rapid advances like those experienced in recent decades, and a number of uncertainties still need to be addressed. Therefore, research and development should also explore fundamentally different alternatives to today's CMOS technology.
The report also recommends developing open interface standards for parallel programming to promote cooperation and innovation in the industry, designing tools and methods for transferring today's sequential computing to parallel applications, and emphasizing parallel computing as part of computer science education.

Related articles

• Future computing boosts will need a revolution (newscientist.com)
• CUDA by Example: An Introduction to General-Purpose GPU Programming, Published By Addison-Wesley Professional (eon.businesswire.com)
• Nvidia looks to the future of GPU computing (zdnet.co.uk)
• Who Wants Parallel Computers? (rjlipton.wordpress.com)

Google multi-source deal drives down cost of 100G optical transceivers

By Nick Flaherty www.flaherty.co.uk

10X10 Multi-Source Agreement established to encourage broad adoption of 100G networks based on 10G signaling specifications

Google has teamed up with leading suppliers Brocade, JDSU and Santur to form a Multi-Source Agreement (the 10X10 MSA) for low cost, low power, pluggable 100G optical transceivers based on 10 optical lanes at 10G.

“The 10X10 MSA is exciting because it provides a roadmap for cost reduction of 100G optical interconnects. Using parallel optics that runs at the same rate as electrical lanes avoids the excess cost and power associated with gearbox devices and brings significant cost relief to 100G equipment.”

The 2km reach goal of the 10X10 MSA bridges the gap between 100m multi-mode and 10km single-mode solutions enabling the roll-out of new networks capable of delivering exponentially higher bandwidth at a significantly lower cost per bit. Unlike 100m multi-mode based on ribbons of fiber, this solution operates on a conventional Single Mode Fibre (SMF) enabling extended reach of 2Km. Compared with other single-mode 100G implementations, this approach does not require 25G electronics such as gearbox ICs to convert 10G data streams to intermediate 25G lanes.

The purpose of the 10X10 MSA is to deliver the industry’s lowest cost 100G solution over 2Km SMF. The 10X10 MSA enables 100G implementation today in modules compliant to the published CFP MSA specifications. Other 10X10 MSA implementations will leverage existing 10G electronics and optics to deliver higher density 100G modules.

“The 10X10 MSA is ready to define a new price and performance trajectory for 100GbE that will significantly accelerate the adoption and economics of 100G deployment," said Scott Kipp, Brocade standards representative and Chair of the 10X10 MSA. "Leveraging 10G technology helps the 10X10 MSA provide the lowest cost solution in terms of bandwidth per meter and bandwidth per Watt.”

“The 10X10 MSA is exciting because it provides a roadmap for cost reduction of 100G optical interconnects. Using parallel optics that runs at the same rate as electrical lanes avoids the excess cost and power associated with gearbox devices and brings significant cost relief to 100G equipment,” said Santur CTO Milind Gokhale.

Users and developers who are interested in joining the 10X10 MSA are encouraged to contact MSA members at info@10x10msa.org.

Related articles

• JDSU and Santur Team to Demonstrate the Industry's First Carrier-Class 100G OTU-4 CFP Modules at OFC/NFOEC 2010 (eon.businesswire.com)
• Luxtera and Siemon Collaborate to Deliver Active Optical Cabling for High Performance Data Centers (eon.businesswire.com)
• Polatis Expands Agreement with JDSU (eon.businesswire.com)