Continuing the success story of STM32, ST's first multi-core microprocessor is launched
Latest update time：2019-10-29
Reads：
Twelve years ago, ST launched the world's first processor STM32 F1 using the ARM Cortex-M core in Beijing, and chose a butterfly as the product logo. In the following decade, the STM32 "butterfly" successfully flew across thousands of mountains and rivers and shook the entire MCU market.
When the "butterfly" met the "penguin" Linux, ST's first MPU was here!
This year, ST expanded the functions of STM32 MCU with years of accumulated Arm Cortex R&D experience and launched the company's first multi-core microprocessor STM32MP1.
At a recent media exchange meeting, Sylvain Raynaud, product marketing manager of STMicroelectronics' microcontroller STM32 microprocessor, said that if three keywords were used to describe this microprocessor, they would be "ten years of supply", "flexible architecture", and "complete ecosystem".
STM32MP1 microprocessor is born!
The launch of STM32MP1 is a continuation of STM32's success story.
As the general market leader of Cortex-M 32, STM32 has become a super MCU platform since ST launched the first STM32F103 in 2007. After 12 years of development, STM32 has become the first microprocessor to support Linux.
STM32MP1 is ST's first microprocessor to support Linux, which will continue STM32's success story and extend STM32's success and commitment to microprocessors.
"As a general-purpose MCU, STM32 faces not only consumer customers, but also industrial control and communication customers. While recognizing ST's quality, these customers also feel ST's long-term support.
For example, the F1, which was mass-produced in 2007, has been on the market for nearly 22 years.
We update this long-term supply guarantee at the beginning of each year, and each update is ten years, so this is a very long-term support for customers' life cycle, including industrial control and communication customers. Therefore, more and more customers trust ST and choose STM32.
" Raynaud said at the meeting.
STM32MP1 is a general-purpose microprocessor suitable for all types of developers and a variety of applications.
For customers who previously used MCU, they can learn to upgrade to use microprocessor applications through STM32MP1;
for customers who previously used microprocessor + MCU applications, STM32MP1 can achieve this function with a single chip;
and for customers who previously used MPU, using STM32MP1 for microprocessor applications can expand ST's customer base.
Therefore, STM32MP1 is a product suitable for all current application developers.
And STM32MP1 supports a variety of potential application scenarios, including industrial applications, consumer electronics, healthcare, smart homes, etc.
The STM32MP1 series microprocessors integrate two 650MHz Arm Cortex-A7 application processors and a 209MHz Arm Cortex-M4 microcontroller.
The Cortex-A7 is responsible for high-speed interfaces and processing performance, while the Cortex-M4 performs real-time control. ST also equips the Cortex-M4 with a 448KB dedicated RAM memory to ensure its running speed.
When talking about the benefits of integrating two different cores, Arm Cortex-A and Cortex-M, Raynaud explained that this flexible computing architecture can balance computing performance and power saving:
-
In the process of human-machine interface and communication processing and motor control and sensing, Cortex-A7 and 3D GPU are responsible for graphics and image processing with a processing speed of 2470 DMIPS; Cortex-M4 is responsible for motor control, sensing and low-power data acquisition with a processing speed of 260 DMIPS.
-
If only motor control and sensing are processed, by pausing the Cortex-A7 to execute instructions and only letting the Cortex-M4 operate, the power consumption is 1/4 of the normal mode.
-
When entering standby mode from this mode, power consumption can be reduced to 1/2500, and it can support returning to the Linux interface in 1 second and returning to the 3D graphics application interface in 3 seconds.
To prevent performance bottlenecks and bandwidth issues in the MPU system, the STM32MP1 supports a variety of DDR SDRAM memories, including DDR3, DDR3L, LPDDR2, and 533MHz 32/16-bit LPDDR3.
In addition, the STM32MP1 also supports a variety of flash memories:
eMMC, SD card, SLC NAND, SPI NAND, and Quad-SPI NOR.
The STM32MP1 also embeds a 3D graphics processor (GPU) to support human-machine interface displays, enabling
advanced HMI development based on the OpenGL ES2.0 interface and native support for Linux and various application frameworks.
External memory supports a variety of DDR SDRAM and flash memory.
Using the STM32MP1 development can enhance the user experience of equipment such as industrial control panels.
Compared with the previous STM32, STM32MP1 is a more complex system because it is an application processor, so ST also provides the STPMIC1 power chip for customers to use.
Raynaud pointed out that STPMIC1 integrates four DC/DC buck converters, six LDO regulators, a DC/DC boost converter, as well as USB VBUS and universal power switch.
STPMIC1 can help customers achieve three important points:
first, optimize the power consumption of the customer system;
second, save costs, if the peripheral cost is relatively complete, because the power supply is very complete;
third, use some discrete independent components to cover the power chip, but the advantage of using this chip is that it can achieve a smaller PCB design, making the design more streamlined.
When STM32 meets Linux, STM32MP1 development becomes more convenient
Relying on the mature STM32 ecosystem, ST provides tools that enable customers to accelerate the successful application of STM32MP1 design and development.
Tool development is divided into three parts:
software, hardware, and customer support.
-
In terms of software, ST provides STM32's Cube, CubeMX , and CubeProgrammer . These three parts can help customers configure hardware and generate an initialization code. CubeProgrammer supports customer security program burning.
-
For hardware, ST provides two types of boards: exploration boards, STM32MP1 supports two sets, simple STM32MP57A-DK1, and STM32MP57C-DK2, with LCD screen and Wifi, Bluetooth communication. The second type is a full-function evaluation board, on which all functional peripherals of STM32MP1 can be evaluated, and customers can directly use this board to speed up customer software development;
-
In terms of customer support, ST has FAEs all over the world, including ST's own technical support in many cities in China. There is also the ST community, ST AE online support for customers, and ST third-party partners who can provide different solutions for customers' reference.
ST is also taking concrete actions to fulfill its commitment to accelerate software development. In order to speed up project development, ST has released a mainstream open source Linux distribution, OpenSTLinux Distribution. The
OpenSTLinux distribution supports development projects on the Cortex-A7 core of the STM32MP1 and includes important components such as the Linux BSP board support package, kernel, driver, boot chain and secure operating system.
A very important point is that the Linux platform of STM32MP1 is fully compatible with the popular OpenLinux development kit.
At present, the STM32MP1 SoC driver has been adopted and recognized by the Linux community. ST's STM32MP1 supports Linux4.19LTS. LTS means that ST will support this software distribution for a long time.
When supporting the entire Linux development source, we are fully compatible with the standards of open source software, including the Linux Foundation and Yocto Project. Because Linux code is open source and there is a lot of it, it is impossible for customers to use all of it or know which ones are good. Therefore, ST has established a Project in Yocto so that customers can use this development package stably and easily.
ST also supports the Linaro community, which includes some reference software and training.
Because Linux is open source, it is public, so the pre-integrated secure operating system OP-TEE. If customers need to find secure applications themselves, they still need to pay. ST has already done this for customers. They can use free encrypted OS to encrypt the system in the trusted area, and all public data uses open source Linux.
This is the entire development package that can simplify the customer development process.
In addition, ST also cooperated with Witekio to port Android to STM32MP1.
In order to enhance customers' trust in the code and enable them to use it with peace of mind, the STM32MP1 series embeds hardware security encryption functions, including TrustZone, encryption algorithms, hash operations, secure boot, anti-tampering pins and real-time clocks.
STM32MP1 is in mass production
STM32MP1 has different packages tailored for a variety of applications.
STM32MP1 has three product lines:
157, 153, and 151.
151 is equipped with Cortex-A7+Cortex M4;
153 adds CAN FD and dual-core Cortex A7 on this basis;
157 is the highest performance in the series, Dual Arm Cortex-A7+Cortex-M4, 3D GPU—DSI—CAN FD.
The provision of STM32MP1 hardware development tools can speed up functional evaluation, system prototype development and product design.
STM32MP1 provides two sets of boards, one is a full-function board, including two evaluation boards, supporting 157A and 157C, 157C is the part with upgraded security encryption functions.
There are two sets of exploration boards, one is streamlined with only MP1 + basic peripherals, and the other is relatively complete in function, because it is equipped with a MIPI screen and a Wi-Fi/BT radio frequency module. When wireless connection is required, it can be used as a prototype for development.
The evaluation board is for customers to evaluate, and the exploration board is for customers to use a set of streamlined boards for prototype development before development, and there is no problem with matching some peripherals for initial research and development.
These three boards are currently available in the STM32 Tmall flagship store.
In addition to those provided by ST itself, there are also development boards and various core boards for commercial applications provided by third parties, including Linaro, worldwide including China. In fact, our commercial core board customers have already launched them on the market and can also be searched online.
Raynaud told everyone:
"Because the STM32MP1 is different from the previous STM32, we have a dedicated wiki website to support STM32MP1 customers to develop Linux platforms. All ST Linux software development kits are released to customers in this platform. Customers can download all kinds of things they need from it. Whether they are beginners or experienced engineers, they can find these applications in it.
"
Conclusion
STM32MP1 is the first MPU product on the market.
Raynaud finally talked about that in the future, when expanding the STM32 MPU product line, two directions will be taken at the same time:
higher cost performance and power consumption optimization.
In the more cost-effective part, a lower-end, more cost-effective product will be released to customers;
and the cost and power consumption will be gradually optimized, and higher performance and safer parts will be released to support customers' higher needs. In the
future, the two lines will run in parallel to expand the entire MPU product line.
*Disclaimer: This article is originally written by the author. The content of the article is the author's personal opinion. Semiconductor Industry Observer reprints it only to convey a different point of view. It does not mean that Semiconductor Industry Observer agrees or supports this point of view. If you have any objections, please contact Semiconductor Industry Observer.
Today is the 2112th issue of content shared by "Semiconductor Industry Observer" for you, welcome to follow.
Recommended Reading
Intel 's storage ambitions
★ Jiangsu chip development history
The bumpy road of China's semiconductor industry
Semiconductor Industry Observation
" The first vertical media in semiconductor industry "
Real-time professional original depth
Scan the QR code , reply to the keywords below, and read more
AI｜ RF ｜Chinese Chip ｜Google Quantum｜CMOS ｜Huawei ｜ IC ｜ Texas Instruments
Reply
Submit your article
and read "How to become a member of "Semiconductor Industry Observer""
Reply Search and you can easily find other articles that interest you!
京公网安备 11010802033920号