Earlier this summer, Atmel expanded its ARM Cortex-M4 Flash lineup with the entry-point SAM4N series. The new microcontrollers (MCUs) – which feature a 100MHz operating frequency – boast up to 1MB of Flash memory, multiple serial communication peripherals and analog capability.
The SAM4N is built around a low power sipping design, achieving real-world consumption levels down to 170µA/MHz in active mode; down to 20µA in sleep mode with full RAM retention & wake-up time down to 10µs; and down to 1µA in backup mode with the RTC running.
Key hardware specs include fast serial communication with 7 UARTs, four SPIs and three I2Cs; 12-bit ADC, 10-bit DAC, integrated voltage reference, multiple timers and PWM. On the software side, there is full IDE support for Atmel Studio 6, IAR and Keil.
Atmel also offers a SAM4N Xplained Pro Eval Kit, a hardware platform that allows engineers to more easily evaluate the Atmel ATSAM4N16C microcontroller. Supported by the Atmel Studio integrated development platform, the kit provides easy access to various Atmel SAM4N features, explaining how to integrate the device in a customer design. Like other Atmel Xplained Pro evaluation kits, the SAM4N Xplained Pro is capable of significantly expanding its original functionality by linking to additional Xplained Pro extension kits.
Aside from the ATSAM4N16 microcontroller, key specs include:
- One reset button
- One yellow user LED
- One user pushbutton (wake-up, bootloader entry or general purpose)
- 32.768kHz crystal
- 12MHz crystal
- 3 Xplained Pro extension headers
- 3 SPARE signal connector
- Embedded debugger
- Auto-ID for board identification in Atmel Studio 6.1
- One yellow status LED
- One green board power LED
- Symbolic debug of complex data types including scope information
- Programming
- Data Gateway Interface: USART, TWI and 4 GPIOs
- Virtual COM port (CDC)
- USB powered
- Supported with application examples in Atmel Software Framework
Atmel’s SAM4N Xplained Pro Evaluation Kit can be purchased here.
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