Low-power wireless microcontrollers MCUs simplify IoT designs

Mouser is now stocking the ultra low-power SimpleLink wireless microcontrollers (MCUs) from Texas Instruments (TI). The wireless MCUs target Bluetooth Smart, ZigBee and other 2.4GHz RF applications. The SimpleLink Wireless MCU platform is very low power with low active RF and run current requirements and provide long battery life when used with small coin-cell batteries or in energy-harvesting applications, says the company. The TI CC26xx SimpleLink MCUs are available in three product models. The CC2650 has a 48MHz ARM(r) Cortex M3 core paired with a 2.4GHz RF transceiver compatible with Bluetooth Smart, ZigBee, 6LoWPAN, and other IEEE 802.15.4 protocols. The CC2640 also has a 48MHz ARM Cortex M3 with a Bluetooth Smart radio for systems targeting compliance with ETSI EN 300 328 (Europe), EN 300 440 Class 2 (Europe), FCC CFR47 Part 15 (US), and ARIB STD T66 (Japan). The CC2630 has a 48MHz ARM Cortex M3 and has a 2.4GHz RF transceiver with an IEEE 802.15.4 PHY and MAC for ZigBee and 6LoWPAN. Each of the three wireless solutions offers a rich feature set of timers and peripherals. A dedicated ARM Cortex M0 on each core manages the radio sections from code embedded in unchangeable ROM. The platform is code and pin-compatible and support Bluetooth Smart, ZigBee, 6LoWPAN, sub 1 GHz, RF4CE and proprietary modes up to 5Mbps, which allows developers to leverage PC board designs across different wireless systems. Each solution is supported by ready to use protocol stacks for Bluetooth, TCP/IP, RTOS, and others. Several development systems are available including the Texas Instruments SimpleLink Bluetooth Smart SensorTag Kit (CC2650STK), allowing developers to quickly receive sensor-based data through their cloud-connected IoT designs.