Date: 05/02/2009

16-Bit MCU extends battery life with lower power & wide operating range

Maxim Integrated Products launched the MAXQ610 16-bit microcontroller. Designed to extend battery life in low-power applications, this device operates from a 1.7V to 3.6V voltage range. Since battery voltages decay over the life of the battery, the wide operating-voltage range allows applications to utilize more battery capacity. To further prolong battery life, the MAXQ610 consumes only a 200nA in stop mode, and delivers up to 12 MIPS at 3.75mA in active operation.

The MAXQ610 is an integrated solution that simplifies the design of low-power applications. The microcontroller includes

1. Two USARTs
2. An SPI master/slave communication port
3. Dual 16-bit timers
4. An 8kHz wakeup timer
5. Up to 38 general-purpose I/O pins capable of supporting an electromechanical or capacitive-touch keypad matrix.
6. Additionally, the MAXQ610 provides a secure memory management unit to prevent device cloning and unauthorized access to sensitive application code.

The stop-mode option allows the designer to switch to a low-power regulator during stop mode, turn off the power-fail monitor, and generate wake-up events from external inputs or from an internal ultra-low-power, programmable 8kHz timer. When exiting stop mode, the power-fail monitor verifies that system power has stabilized before it allows the microcontroller to execute code. If the system power is below the minimum operating voltage (< 1.7V), the MAXQ610 goes into a power-checking mode until the voltage returns to above 1.7V.

At the heart of the MAXQ610 is a MAXQ RISC core. The MAXQ core executes nearly all instructions in a single clock cycle. This capability increases instruction bandwidth and allows designers to reduce clock frequency. By distributing clocks to only those circuits that require clocking at any instant, this architecture minimizes power consumption as well as noise that can affect sensitive analog circuits.

The MAXQ610 provides multiple levels of security to protect the IP. With a user-definable scrambling key, the MAXQ610 stores application code in an obfuscated format, increasing the difficulty of reverse engineering. In addition, a customer-assigned application key can be programmed into the MAXQ610 during manufacturing. This key allows a customer's application code to validate against the MAXQ610 hardware and prevent code execution if the validation fails.

The MAXQ610 is ideally suited for battery-powered equipment such as sensors, universal remote controls, meters, and data loggers.


Package: 40-pin TQFN
Price: each $1.22 for 10 K pieces (FOB USA).

For more information, go to www.maxim-ic.com