Issue 155 June 2003
Encore!
Zilog's Z8 Flash Memory-Based Micro

ENCORE!

As a wise elder would say, “flash memory alone does not a successful product make, my young padiwan.” Zilog seems to be one with the force, and as such it compliments the flash memory capabilities with plenty of useful peripherals.

Figure 1 shows all of the goodies possible with the Z8 Encore!. This microcontroller revs up the execution of instructions at up to 10 MIPS. With 16 to 64 KB of flash memory, there’s plenty of room for your application. Your client’s last-minute changes can be handled at any time thanks to the in-circuit programming capability. RAM comes in two sizes—2 and 4 KB—for the larger stack and data-table applications.

All of the peripherals are included in each Z8 Encore! product in the family’s portfolio. So, you don’t have to wonder which parts contain certain peripherals. Now, because of the I/O limits on the smaller parts, not every product contains the maximum number of each peripheral. But you can be assured that they all contain some of the available peripherals.

For precise analog measurements, all of the parts have at least eight analog inputs to the sigma-delta, 10-bit A/D converter. And, for precision timing, each flavor has a minimum of three 16-bit timers. Each timer is capable of PWM output. In addition, every Z8 Encore! has two 9-bit UARTs, and they support both SPI and I2C interface protocols.

Moving data is of the utmost importance; therefore, three DMA channels support background data shuffling. The interrupt structure supports interrupts from 24 sources, including GPIO pins and internal peripherals. And maybe of most importance (to software designers, at least) is the single-pin debugger. Let’s look a little closer at these features.