Tag Archives: shipping

Atmel ships second-gen maXStylus Active Pen


Atmel is now shipping its second generation Windows 8.1-certified maXStylus in volume quantities. The new capacitive active stylus controller delivers a near-perfect ‘pen-to-paper’ writing experience on a touchscreen with superior responsiveness.

According to Shar Narasimhan, Atmel Sr. Product Marketing Manager of Touchscreen and Stylus Products, touchscreens ranging from 6” to 15.6” using Atmel’s maXTouch controllers can seamlessly support maXStylus without additional hardware components or design changes.

“These solutions include our recently launched maXTouch T Series devices ranging from the mXT640T to the mXT2952T single-chip solutions. This integrated solution eliminates the need for an additional sensor layer, lowering overall system costs for the OEM without compromising performance,” Narasimhan explained. “The complete maXTouch and maXStylus solution has achieved Microsoft’s Windows 8.1 certification and can be [easily] integrated into [Microsoft] Windows 8.1 or [Google’s] Android OS.”

Narasimhan also noted that Atmel’s Stylus heralds a new era of interaction with smart devices as users seek a more intuitive experience on their smartphones, tablets, notebooks and Ultrabooks.

“These smart devices also require richer feature sets to differentiate their products,” he said. “We deliver the closest pen-to-paper experience available today for users writing with a capacitive active stylus on a touchscreen. Our next-generation maXStylus pen is currently in mass production with tier 1 OEMs and will be available on store shelves in early Q1.”

Today, competing active stylus solutions compromise the noise immunity and power levels of a system as the touchscreen struggles to distinguish between the pen and the user’s fingers. This degrades the overall system power consumption, signal-to-noise (SNR) ratio and pressure sensitivity resulting in missing strokes, dropped touches, poor linearity and an overall inferior user experience. 

With Atmel’s integrated solution, the maXStylus mXTS200 uses intelligent scanning and synchronization with the touch controller to deliver a higher SNR ratio. This results in the best capacitive stylus writing experience available on the market today – without comprising the touch controller’s noise immunity and power consumption of the overall system.

In addition, the maXStylus mXTS200 features intelligent palm rejection and the capability to switch from writing with a stylus to using both large and small fingers, without degrading capacitive touchscreen touch performance.

Interested in learning more? You can check out Atmel’s official maXStylus site here.

Atmel ships new ARM Cortex M0+ processor-based MCUs in volume

Atmel is now shipping its recently launched SAM D20 microcontroller (MCU) lineup in production quantities. As previously discussed on Bits & Pieces, the SAM D20 is the first series in a new family of ultra-low power embedded Flash microcontrollers based on ARM’s powerful Cortex-M0+ processor.

thinkbeyondcore

“In this era of the Internet of Things (IoT), products used in building automation, consumer electronics, smart metering and industrial controls are becoming smarter and more connected,” Mr. Ingar Fredriksen, Atmel’s Sr. Director of Flash-based Microcontrollers, explained. “With Atmel’s new SAM D20 MCU available to the mass market, designers now have access to a new Cortex M0+ based MCU to easily add more intelligence and connectivity to next-gen IoT devices.”

According to Mr. Fredriksen, the new series combines innovative and proven technologies, including intelligent peripherals with Atmel’s Event System as well as capacitive touch support for button, slider and wheel capability and proximity sensing.
The new SAM D20 series is also supported by the latest version of Atmel Studio and Atmel Software Framework, the integrated development platform of choice for developing and debugging ARM Cortex-M and Atmel AVR MCU-based applications.

“We’ve built our decades of innovation and experience in embedded Flash MCU technology into our new Atmel SAM D20 family,” Mr. Fredriksen continued. “That is why the SAM D20 sets a new benchmark for flexibility and ease-of-use, while combining the performance and energy efficiency of the ARM Cortex-M0+ core with an optimized architecture and peripheral set. We’ve brought true differentiation into this new family, making it the ideal MCU for low-power, cost-sensitive industrial and consumer applications.”

Additional information about Atmel’s SAM D20 can be found here.