Cypress Semiconductor has introduced PSoC Creator 2.1, the Integrated Design Environment for the PSoC 3 and PSoC 5 programmable system-on-chip families. The new software update includes over 100 new features and enhancements, accelerating digital designs more than 80% on average, simplifying analog designs, and greatly improving ease of use. PSoC Creator allows users to configure PSoC programmable hardware into a custom one-chip solution. It includes a rich library of over 75 fully characterized analog and digital Components—“virtual chips,” represented by an icon—that users can drag-and-drop into a design and configure to suit a broad array of application requirements. Components integrate system interfaces and discrete ICs into a PSoC solution, reducing BOM costs and board-space. Cypress regularly releases “Component Packs” that provide new Components and update existing Components.
PSoC Creator 2.1 features improved programmable digital logic placement and routing, increasing maximum peripheral speeds. For example, the new placement and routing algorithms boosts the Pulse Width Modulator Component’s input frequency to 44 MHz—a 76% gain that enables higher resolution PWMs and faster switching speeds for a wide variety of applications such as motor and power control. Programmable digital components including timers, counters and others also benefit from this dramatic performance improvement, with increases of more than 80% on average. The new Analog Device Editor simplifies the development and debugging of analog designs. Developers draw their analog circuit in the PSoC Creator schematic-entry tool. In the build cycle, PSoC Creator automatically configures the underlying PSoC programmable hardware. It enables developers to optimize analog circuits graphically and lock them so they never change.
