Here’s a look at the electronics and sensors deployed inside a widely used fitness watch. Leland Teschler Executive Editor The fitness tracking firm Fitbit says it sold something over 21 million fitness watches last year. To get an idea of how fitness watches work their magic, we tore down one of the more popular fitness […]
Consumer Electronics
What do you look for in MCUs, by application, across various vertical markets?
Embedded engineers design and develop electronics hardware and software for many different market segments, often called “vertical markets.” Major vertical markets include automotive, medical, industrial, military/aerospace, and consumer electronics. Of these major markets, some commonly desired attributes of electronics emerge. Automotive requirements include small size, low weight, low cost, power efficient, reliable electronics with ratings […]
Ultra-low power e-paper driver support added to LaunchPad development kits
Pervasive Displays (PDi), a world leader in e-paper displays today announced the results of its collaboration with community-driven and open source electronics prototyping platform provider Energia. The Energia integrated development environment (IDE) provides similar support for the Texas Instruments (TI) family of LaunchPad™ development platforms as the Arduino and Wiring IDE. Designed to bring the […]
SoC makes cardless set-top-boxes more secure
ALi Corporation, a leading Set-Top Box (STB) chipset provider, today announced that it has further extended its partnership with security partner Conax, a leader in total content and service protection for digital entertainment services. As the first chipset provider receiving Conax CP 6.0 certification for cardless, ALi has integrated its HEVC series system on chip […]
Reference design covers multiport USB Type-C and Power Delivery minidocks
Texas Instruments today introduced a multiport USB Type-C and Power Delivery (PD) minidock reference design that provides audio, USB data, power and video support. This new TI Designs reference design can be powered by a traditional power adapter, USB Type-C adapter or notebook computer, offering end users flexible, intelligent functionality. The reference design provides a […]
SSD controller optimized for next-gen slim computing devices
Marvell a world leader in storage, cloud infrastructure, Internet of Things (IoT), connectivity and multimedia semiconductor solutions, today announced the expansion of its solid-state drive (SSD) portfolio to include the 88NV1160 Non-Volatile Memory (NVM) Express DRAM-less SSD controller. Marvell’s 88NV1160 DRAM-less SSD controller provides the industry’s leading performance per Watt and up to 1600MB/s read […]
Converter handles 4K60 HDR video with HDCP2.2 protection
MegaChips Corporation today announced production shipments of the MCDP2900, the industry’s most advanced audio-video converter –from DisplayPort to HDMI2.0b — featuring unprecedented user experience features like HDR and HDCP2.2 repeater functions. The power-optimized converter facilitates secured transmission of 4K60Hz High Dynamic Range (HDR) content between personal, mobile, and consumer electronics through USB Type-C and other […]
USBXpress controller simplifies USB connectivity for embedded designs
Silicon Labs has added a smaller, lower-power member to its family of USBXpress™ bridge devices, providing a simpler, faster way to add Universal Serial Bus (USB) connectivity to new and legacy embedded designs. Silicon Labs’ new CP2102N USB controller eliminates complex, time-consuming firmware development and provides advanced functionality in QFN packages as small as 3 […]
USB controllers work with latest Type-C specs
Fairchild announced that its FUSB302 family of USB Type-C controllers are the industry’s first to be compatible with the latest updates to the USB Type-C standard, including Power Delivery (PD) specification. This enables manufacturers using the FUSB302 to easily support all current and previous versions of the USB Type-C specifications in their products. The USB […]
BLE chips pull just 3.6 mA in transmit mode
Toshiba America Electronic Components, Inc. (TAEC) today introduced three new integrated circuits (ICs) that support Bluetooth® Low Energy (LE)1 ver.4.1 communications for Bluetooth Smart devices2, including wearable electronics, sensors and high-end coin battery-powered devices. At 3V supply voltage, the TC35678FSG, TC35678FXG, and TC35679FSG consume just under half the power of previous Toshiba products3 – in […]







