Atmel Introduces an AVR32 Digital Audio Gateway Reference Design for Digital Audio Streaming, Decoding and Playback

San Jose, California (ots/PRNewswire) -

Atmel(R) Corporation (Nasdaq: ATML) announced today the AVR(R)32
ATEVK1105 Digital Audio Gateway kit, demonstrating digital audio
streaming, decoding and playback. These audio capabilities serve the
exploding market of audio accessories and peripherals that connects
home and car Hi-Fi audio systems to the digital age. This includes
the popular iPod(R) docking stations. The kit is based on the AVR
high performance AT32UC3A 32-bit Flash microcontrollers and provides
developers with a ready-to-use hardware/software platform and a
variety of interfaces and evaluation capabilities to meet their audio
systems requirements and get faster to market.

The fast AVR32 CPU featuring DSP instructions is perfect for
audio decoding tasks, and the UC3A handles two audio interfaces. For
high quality stereo output, the chip has a stereo 16-bit bitstream
audio DAC with internal FIR and Comb filters. For 4-channel or full
surround sound, an IIS interface is available for connection to an
external audio codec. Both interfaces are supported with drivers that
make full use of the AVR32 peripheral DMA controller which
significantly reduces the CPU overhead.

The ATEVK1105 board comes preloaded with software that
demonstrates audio playback. A booted kit will scan any USB mass
storage device for MP3 or other audio files and play them back. The
kit's software will even scan the ID3 tag and present album artist
and song information on the 2" QVGA onboard display. MP3 decoding
from a USB mass storage device requires only a third of the AVR32's
processing capacity, leaving plenty of headroom for running the
operation system, streaming the data and refreshing the display.

Customers with a license from Apple(R) are able to interface the
kit to a iPod or iPhone(R) using an authorized Apple authentication
chip adapter.

The AVR32 microcontrollers are built for high data throughput
rates and features dual port SRAM, a 6-layer databus and a
multi-channel peripheral DMA controller to help speed things up. This
is required when the UC3A features a 100 Mb/s Ethernet port, a 12
Mb/s USB port, two 33Mb/s SPI ports, four high speed USARTs, one IIS
interface and two I2C compatible interfaces. The USB port has
On-The-Go host function, allowing it to act as a host when connected
to USB devices such as keyboard, mouse, mass storage or audio.

For applications where the on-chip 512 KB Flash and 64 KB SRAM is
not sufficient, the EVK1105 demonstrates how to connect an external
SDRAM, serial DataFlash, SD card reader and USB hard disk or memory
stick.

The ATEVK1105 also features connectors for future wireless
expansion modules supporting IEE802.15.4(TM)/ZigBee(R), and
Bluetooth(R).

Availability and pricing

Atmel provides all the source code free of charge, including
software drivers for all peripherals, TCP/IP stack and various USB
class drivers. This is available in the AVR32 Software Framework, a
software library integrated with the AVR32 Studio development suite.
Atmel also releases the schematics and Gerber files to allow
customers to easily incorporate elements of the kit into their own
designs.

The ATEVK1105 Digital Audio Gateway kit will be available from
Atmel's distributors in March 2009 with a resale price of US$179.

About Atmel

Atmel is a worldwide leader in the design and manufacture of
microcontrollers, advanced logic, mixed-signal, nonvolatile memory
and radio frequency (RF) components. Leveraging one of the industry's
broadest intellectual property (IP) technology portfolios, Atmel is
able to provide the electronics industry with complete system
solutions focused on consumer, industrial, security, communications,
computing and automotive markets.

(c) 2009 Atmel Corporation. All Rights Reserved. Atmel(R), Atmel
logo and combinations thereof, AVR(R) and others, are registered
trademarks, or trademarks of Atmel Corporation or its subsidiaries.
Other terms and product names may be trademarks of others.

Information:

Atmel's AVR32 product information may be retrieved at
www.atmel.com/avr32

Additional product information about the ATEVK1105 Digital Audio
Gateway kit may be retrieved at www.atmel.com/evk1105

Press Contact:
Helen Perlegos, Public Relations
Tel: +1-408-487-2963, Email: helen.perlegos@atmel.com

ots Originaltext: Atmel Corporation
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Contact:
Helen Perlegos, Public Relations of Atmel Corporation,
+1-408-487-2963, helen.perlegos@atmel.com