Always-on and the new wearable core

Always-on and the new wearable core
by Don Dingee on 06-01-2014 at 11:00 am

Recently, I mentioned smartphone SoCs consume one, maybe two orders of magnitude too much power for broader use in wearables. However, that is only when they are “on”. To save power and stretch battery life, smartphones spend a lot of time napping – display off, sitting still with MEMS sensors powered down, waiting for an incoming… Read More


What’s not quite MCU, and not quite SoC?

What’s not quite MCU, and not quite SoC?
by Don Dingee on 05-21-2014 at 10:10 am

There has been a lot of railing lately about how we don’t have quite the right chips for the upcoming wave of wearables. Chips one would drop in a smartphone are often overkill and overpowered, burning through electrons too quickly. Chips one would use for a simple control task generally lack peripherals and performance, offsetting… Read More


More things on the DSP frontier at MWC14

More things on the DSP frontier at MWC14
by Don Dingee on 02-23-2014 at 12:00 pm

With a well-chronicled share inside cellular baseband interfaces for mobile devices, one might think that is the entire CEVA story, especially going into Mobile World Congress 2014 this week. MWC is still a phone show, but is becoming more and more about the Internet of Things and wearables, and CEVA and its ecosystem are showing… Read More