XA 16-bit microcontroller family 512 B RAM, watchdog, 2 UARTs

The Philips Semiconductors XA (eXtended Architecture) family of 16-bit single-chip microcontrollers is powerful enough to easily handle the requirements of high performance embedded applications, yet inexpensive enough to compete in the market for high-volume, low-cost applications.

The XA family provides an upward compatibility path for 80C51 users who need higher performance and 64k or more of program memory. Existing 80C51 code can also easily be translated to run on XA microcontrollers.

The performance of the XA architecture supports the comprehensive bit-oriented operations of the 80C51 while incorporating support for multi-tasking operating systems and high-level languages such as C. The speed of the XA architecture, at 10 to 100 times that of the 80C51, gives designers an easy path to truly high performance embedded control.

The XA architecture supports:

• Upward compatibility with the 80C51 architecture
• 16-bit fully static CPU with a 24-bit program and data address range
• Eight 16-bit CPU registers each capable of performing all arithmetic and logic operations as well as acting as memory pointers. Operations may also be performed directly to memory.
• Both 8-bit and 16-bit CPU registers, each capable of performing all arithmetic and logic operations.
• An enhanced instruction set that includes bit intensive logic operations and fast signed or unsigned 16?16 multiply and 32 / 16 divide
• Instruction set tailored for high level language support
• Multi-tasking and real-time executives that include up to 32 vectored interrupts, 16 software traps, segmented data memory, and banked registers to support context switching
• Low power operation, which is intrinsic to the XA architecture, includes power-down and idle modes.

More detailed information on the core is available in the XA User Guide.