Visit Booths #863 and #614 for USB 3.0, PMIC and IBIC Technology Demonstrations
SANTA CLARA, Calif., September 13, 2011 — Renesas Electronics America Inc. will highlight its connectivity and power management technologies at the Intel Developer Forum (IDF) 2011, September 13-15, at Moscone Center West in San Francisco. Demonstrations will showcase USB 3.0, power management IC (PMIC) and intelligent buffer IC (IBIC) solutions for consumer electronics devices such as PCs and laptops, set-top boxes, smart phones and tablets.
USB Product and Technology Demonstrations: SuperSpeed USB Community, Booth #863
Renesas Electronics America will feature a live demonstration of its USB 3.0 SATA3 bridge controller (µPD720230)—the world’s first USB 3.0 bridge SoC that supports the UASP (USB Attached SCSI Protocol), which helps to significantly speed up throughput for large volumes of data.
Comprising a PC with two SATA boards (one each for the BOT and UAS protocols), a USB 3.0 card and four real SSD drives, the demonstration will illustrate the performance difference between BOT and UAS for high data-transfer speeds. For example, when connected to an SSD that supports 6 gigabits per second (Gbps) SATA3, Renesas' µPD720230 device achieves data-transfer performance greater than 370 megabytes per second (MB/s) in UASP mode.
Power Management IC and Intelligent Buffer IC Technology Demonstrations: Booth #614
Renesas will also highlight its innovative power management IC (PMIC) and intelligent buffer IC (IBIC) technologies.
PMIC: In September 2010, Renesas announced its PMIC support for tablets and netbooks based on the Intel® AtomTM Z6xx Series and Intel SM35 Express Chipset (formerly “Oak Trail”) platform. At IDF 2011, Renesas will showcase a trio of Oak Trail-based devices (tablets and smart phone) powered by Renesas PMICs that are currently shipping, among them one considered to be the world’s smallest Windows®7 PC as of May 2011. With more than 25 years of system know-how in power management, Renesas offers PMICs with exceptional power-efficiency capabilities, resulting in longer battery life and a richer experience for end users. When compared to the generation prior to the Intel Atom Z6xx Series, the Renesas PMIC solution enables up to a 50-percent reduction in average power consumption with full HD-video playback. Renesas PMICs are used in many of the top-tier Oak Trail-based devices today. Visit booth #614 so Renesas can share how its experience with a large number of development projects can expedite a designer’s Oak Trail product plan.
IBIC: Renesas also will demonstrate its intelligent buffer IC technologies at IDF 2011, including one of its MIPI DSI-to-RGB bridge with buffer chips, which helps to reduce power consumption for portable, high-resolution display devices by offloading display-content refresh tasks from the CPU and by reducing LED backlight current while maintaining image quality. The offloading allows the CPU to go into a sleep mode during still-image refresh, reducing system power consumption and extending battery life. Reduced LED backlight current, due to both image content-based backlight control and ambient light-based backlight control, further reduces system power consumption to extend battery life. Renesas' “Tremolo” platform supports the MIPI standard, allowing system designers to connect cost-efficient, RAM-less display modules using a range of resolutions to any processor platform based on this interface standard. A Tremolo device for LVDS-based tablet displays is in development, which will carry forward the same CPU offloading and LED backlight current reducing capabilities of the earlier devices in the Tremolo series.
Renesas' Leadership in USB
As a member of the USB Implementers Forum (USB-IF) since 1996, Renesas Electronics (formerly NEC Electronics) has played a leading role both in defining USB standards and in developing USB technology. In April 2000, the company (then NEC Electronics) launched the µPD720100 device, the world's first USB 2.0-compliant host controller chip and an extensive lineup of other USB devices, and has earned a reputation for delivering dedicated customer service and high quality.
In May 2009, Renesas Electronics (then NEC Electronics) introduced the industry's first USB 3.0 xHCI host controller and, only after four months of its release, the company became the world’s first to earn the "Certified SuperSpeed USB (USB 3.0)" certification from the USB-IF, and also started mass production of the µPD720200 host controller. In the following year, the company released its second USB 3.0 xHCI host controller (µPD720200A) and passed the compliance and certification testing in only two months. These host controllers have become the de facto USB 3.0 host controller standard realizing the best interoperability between PCs and PC peripherals that support USB 3.0.
Following these devices, two new host controllers joined the Renesas USB 3.0 product lineup in March 2011 to deliver even faster transfer speeds, better power efficiency, and more compact size than the company’s previous versions of USB 3.0 host controllers.
Renesas Electronics is the world’s largest producer of USB 3.0 host controllers and provides complete USB 3.0 solutions, which includes device drivers for Windows XP, VistaTM and Windows 7. Renesas Electronics also licenses both host and device-side USB 3.0 IP and offers USB host- and device-side building blocks within its custom ASIC libraries for companies wishing to design and market their own USB 3.0 integrated circuits.
Innovation in Power Management
The Renesas PMIC solutions combine power management, logic, user interface, plus audio and voice communications functions to maximize battery life, support high levels of integration and minimize board space. This solution enables the development of a new class of devices that will put broadband wireless Internet access, multimedia playback, navigation, gaming, social networking and other Web 2.0 and real-time Web applications in a user’s pocket.
For more than 15 years, Renesas Electronics (formerly NEC Electronics) has developed highly integrated PMICs that have been adopted broadly for use in portable consumer electronics devices, including cell phones. As a technology leader with a world-class PMIC line developed in one of the most advanced process nodes available, Renesas remains committed to providing support for leading-edge, highly integrated PMIC solutions.
About Renesas Electronics America Inc.
Renesas Electronics America Inc., headquartered in Santa Clara, California, is a wholly owned subsidiary of Renesas Electronics Corporation (TSE: 6723), the world's number one supplier of microcontrollers and a premier supplier of advanced semiconductor solutions including microcontrollers, SoC solutions, and a broad range of analog and power devices. In the Americas, Renesas Electronics America markets and sells industrial-type active-matrix LCD modules from NEC LCD Technologies, Ltd., a global leader in innovative display technologies. More information about the products offered by Renesas Electronics America can be found at www.renesas.com.
Intel, Windows, Vista and Atom are trademarks or registered trademarks of Intel Corporation. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners.
The content in the press release, including, but not limited to, product prices and specifications, is based on the information as of the date indicated on the document, but may be subject to change without prior notice.