Texas Instruments (TI) has
introduced a device roadmap that is said to include the industry's
lowest power, floating point digital signal processors (DSPs).
Aimed at
portable products that typically have days or weeks of battery life, the
processor roadmap includes 15 new multi-architecture devices. TI engineers say
the new processors could be employed in software-defined radio, bar-code
scanners, e-books, audio recorders, digital stethoscopes and hands-free car
kits, among other end products.
"Developers
are trying to squeeze twice as much performance out of their products and still
keep the same battery life," says John Dixon, low power product line manager
for TI. "These devices can give them the same battery life with more
performance or the same performance with longer battery life."
The new
platform of processors includes TMS320C674x
DSPs, which combines low power with high precision, the TMS320C640x
DSPs, which offer high performance at half the power and the OMAP-L1x
SoCs, which combine multimedia performance with low power. Another family of
processors known as the TMS320C550x
are targeted at applications that need maximum battery life.
TI
engineers say the TMS320C674x family offers some of the best power numbers
of any floating point DSP.
"We've reached a new power threshold with that
device," Dixon
says. "It has 20 times lower standby power than existing floating point DSPs,
and it runs at one-third the total power of any other floating point DSP on the
market."
TI has
targeted the TMS320C674x for the fourth quarter of 2008 and plans to roll out
the TMS320C640x and the OMAP-L1x for early 2009.
The
rollouts are part of a larger strategy by TI to introduce new power-stingy
devices. Earlier this summer, TI
unveiled an MSP430 microcontroller that offers active current consumption
that's three times better than its previous generation.
Tweet This
3 
