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<DIV>> I assume that the relevant application requires some non-trivial
CPU power. I would </DIV>
<DIV>> exclude e.g. a 486-based systems. </DIV>
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<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>I'm not sure that's the case. The industry
has gone in the direction of throwing lots of silicon at a problem, often as an
excuse for poorly written code, sometimes in an interpreted language.
There are a number of high integration CPUs out there that I suspect could do
this sort of thing. I develop device controllers for a variety of industry
needs. They tend to have Ethernet, RS-232, sometimes 1 Mb/s synchronous
communication. G711, quarter VGA color LCD with touchscreen and control loops
running at about a 1 ms rate. The entire code takes less than 256K in
C. My choice of processor is the DStni Ex (made by Lantronix and sold by
Grid Connect) which is a high integration, high speed 186 core with two 10/100
Ethernet Ports and 256K of RAM on it in addition to the usual assortment of
other stuff. The above required platform adds three support chips (one
being the LCD controller). The CPU can run over 100 MHz. Memory
accesses take one clock and typical instructions take two or three. Cost
is in the $10 to $20 range for the chip and power consumption is around 1 W (the
LCD backlight takes more than that!)</FONT></DIV>
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<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>I'm sure there are several other comparable
platforms out there, such as by Digi International. The Geode is a good
candidate as are some VIA chips, if one wants to use protected mode x86.
The biggest thing for this is don't even consider Intel. For most of their
life they have not provided cutting edge solutions for embedded use. Most
of their stuff consumes too much power. And most importantly, they are
targeting the very volatile, short lived PC market. By the time you get an
embedded design up and running and reach market penetration, you won't be able
to buy the chip any more.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Wilton</FONT></DIV>
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