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Microchip release dual core MCUs, talk about development and operational gains — Parallax Forums

Microchip release dual core MCUs, talk about development and operational gains

https://www.microchip.com/pressreleasepage/dual-core-dspic-design-separately-integrate-seamlessly

Good to see multiple cores getting more 'air time' in the Microcontroller space.
This is more loosely coupled than a P1, it's really more like two MCUs in one package, each with some peripherals, and FIFO/Mailbox interfaces between the 2 cores.
The P2 has much larger and common shared memory, and any P2 Core can access any Smart Pin cell peripheral.

Still, this applies even better to P2 :)

“Customers tell us one of their biggest challenges is integrating software from multiple teams where one team is focused on the time-critical control code and another is working on the rest of the application,” said Joe Thomsen, vice president of Microchip’s MCU16 business unit. “We created this dual-core product to simplify that software integration and optimize the performance for math-intensive applications.”

Strange they tag one core as 90MHz and the other as 100MHz ? They do seem to have two (four?) PLLs, making the cores quite independent clock domains.

PLL rules : For PLL operation, the following requirements must be met at all times without exception:
• The PLL Input Frequency (FPLLI) must be in the range of 8 MHz to 64 MHz
• The PFD Input Frequency (FPFD) must be in the range of 8 MHz to (FVCO/16) MHz
• The VCO Output Frequency (FVCO) must be in the range of 400 MHz to 1600 MHz

So how fast can parts of this chip clock ?
Find this "Note: DAC input frequency needs to be 500 MHz." - note that's a PDM + RC filter type DAC, so needs a high clock, still 500MHz is impressive.
SPI says 2~32b, 50MHz (or 40MHz or 15/9MHz, varies in data) (but no QuadSPI ? )
i2c Max 1MHz
UARTS - has 19:0b Divisor, and says
1 = Uses fractional Baud Rate Generation
0 = Uses legacy divide-by-x counter for baud clock generation (x = 4 or 16 depending on the BRGH bit)
BCLKSEL<1:0>: Baud Clock Source Selection bits
11 = Reserved
10 = FOSC
01 = Reserved
00 = FOSC/2 (FP)


Fosc is harder to nail down, but seems to be faster than the CPU clock, Fcy is FOsc/2 thru FOsc/2/128 in doze mode.
Looks like Fosc = Fpllo/2 is possible, where Fpllo is FVCO/(1~7)(1~7) - examples in data are 200MHz,240MHz,300MHz,400MHz for /2 = 100MHz~200MHz indicated Baud/Timer clocks ?

Clocking looks complex, and not easy to be sure you have not overclocked some peripheral.

Comments

  • >
    > "Clocking looks complex, and not easy to be sure you have not overclocked some peripheral."

    I can well attest to that statement. I overclocked my Trash 80 and turned it in to a boat anchor.
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