Eight 32-Bit Cores Take Flight In Multiprocessor Microcontroller

摘要

New processor architectures are rare, especially in the microcontroller arena. But Parallax created a chip that could rotate right into your next application. The Parallax Propeller consists of eight identical RISC-style processing units called cogs (see the figure). The chip runs on 80 MHz, but it only consumes 75 mA with all cogs running. If you cut back to one cog using the internal clock at 20 kHz, the power drain drops to the 3-μA range. Each cog can access all of the 32 I/O pins. Usually, though, an application running on a cog will use only a few pins. A typical example of a cog application is a full-duplex serial port interface that would utilize two pins. Hardware flow control adds two pins. Want two serial ports? Fire up another cog.