XMOS Hardware Development Kit Provides Fast Track to Software Defined Silicon Designs

BRISTOL, England -- Sep 25, 2008 -- XMOS, the creator of Software Defined Silicon, has introduced a credit card sized development board that provides everything needed to start developing applications based on its XS1-G family of programmable devices. The XC-1 development board is available as part of the US$99 XC-1 hardware development kit and comes with all necessary support hardware and immediate access to XMOS' web-based tool suite.

The XC-1 development board is powered from the host workstation's USB port, which also serves as the debug and download connection. Programmes are designed, compiled and simulated using the on-line embedded development environment and downloaded to the development board. To further accelerate development cycles, users have access to online sample code, demonstration projects, tutorials and a quick start guide.

At the heart of the XC-1 board is the XS1-G4 programmable chip, offering four 32-bit, XCore(TM) event-driven processors, capable of executing up to 32 simultaneous real-time tasks and managing up to 400 million events per second. With 1600MIPS performance, 256Kbytes of RAM and 32Kbytes of ROM, the chip will handle a broad range of hardware and software functions, from I/O interfaces through to DSP algorithms.

In its 85mm x 54mm format, the development board provides four pushbuttons, four status LEDs and 12 bi-colour LEDs, along with a speaker for use with a software-driven 1-bit DAC. Up to two XLink(TM) ports are available for connecting multiple XC-1 boards. The small form-factor means the board is ideal for installation in target applications and in deeply embedded systems.

The XC-1 development board is easily interfaced to existing system hardware via 60 user I/O pins, and additional circuit components can be added using the board's 0.1 inch pitch through-hole prototyping area. Complementing the XDK system development kit, the XC-1 is the newest member of the XMOS family of development hardware and can be purchased online from http://www.xmos.com/xc1