IGN Reviews Guitar Hero World Tour's New Gear

Game site IGN reviewed the new hardware for Activision's upcoming Guitar Hero: World Tour video game.

The Guitar
World Tour introduces a new guitar controller that is even more feature-laden than past designs. Before you get in a huff about just buying the Les Paul or X-plorer models from past Guitar Hero games, know that Activision has told us these will still work in World Tour. They just won't have access to all of the new stuff the added features bring to the table. That being said, you're going to want the new axe.

Apparently, there's a new music creator feature that is pretty impressive. I can't wait to check it out when the game releases this fall.

Microchip Technology Announces MiWi Peer-to-Peer Wireless Protocol Stack

Microchip Technology Inc. (NASDAQ: MCHP), a leading provider of microcontroller and analog semiconductors, today announced the MiWi(TM) Peer-to-Peer (P2P) Wireless Protocol Stack, which is based upon the IEEE 802.15.4(TM) specification. Available as a free download from Microchip's new online Wireless Design Center at www.microchip.com/wireless, the small-footprint, proprietary stack complements the new MRF24J40MA 2.4 GHz FCC-certified transceiver module and is targeted for low-cost, low-power applications, such as sensors, remote control, lighting and metering.

Read the full press release here.

EDN's Q&A with Microchip's CEO Steve Sanghi

Electronic Business recently spoke with Steve Sanghi, president, CEO, and chairman of Microchip Technology Inc, on the economy’s impact on the microcontroller market, the company’s entrance into 32-bit MCUs, and why it still banks on 8- and 16-bit MCUs as a sustainable sales opportunity.

Read the article here.

iPhone 3G is finally official, starts at $199, available July 11th

Apple finally took the wraps off its 3G iPhone. Thinner edges, full plastic back, flush headphone jack, and the iPhone 2.0 firmware. I'm sure you can find more info all over the inter webs, but in case you haven't, check out Engadget's coverage.

Using C32's Multilib when building a project from MPLAB IDE

Hopefully, most MPLAB C Compiler for PIC32 MCUs users know that the toolchain supports multilibs, target libraries built under a permutated set of options. To take advantage of these libraries when building a project under MPLAB IDE, be sure to set the library-selection options under the linker's build options as shown in the MPLAB IDE 8.10 screenshot below.


If you don't set these options, you will get the default unoptimized libraries. In many (if not most) cases, you'll want an optimized version of these libraries.

You can read more about multilibs in the MPLAB C32 User's Guide.

Invoking MADD instruction from C

Generally, C programmers don't have to worry about the assembly instructions that their C compiler generates. We have, however, received a few messages asking if the MPLAB C Compiler for PIC32 (aka MPLAB C32) supports the MADD instruction. Yes, it does. The compiler tries to avoid using the HI/LO registers, but the code below shows a sequence that invokes the MADD instruction (as of C32 1.02).

EDIT1: You'll need to build with at least the -O1 level of optimization.

int dp (int a[], int b[], int n);

int ary1[] = {1,2,3,4,5};
int ary2[] = {6,7,8,9,10};
volatile int testval;

int main(void)
{ 
 testval = dp (ary1, ary2, 5);
 while(1);
}

int dp (int a[], int b[], int n)
{
  /*
   *   move  a3,a0
   */

  int i;
  long long acc = (long long) a[0] * b[0];
  /*    
   *   lw v1,0(a1)
   *   lw a0,0(a0)
   */

  for (i = 1; i < n; i++)
  /*
   *   li t0,1
   *   slt   v0,t0,a2
   *   beqz  v0,9d00005c 
   *   mult  a0,v1
   *   addiu a1,a1,4
   *   addiu a0,a3,4
   *   addiu a2,a2,-1
   */

  acc += (long long) a[i] * b[i];
  /*
   *   lw t1,0(a0)
   *   lw a3,0(a1)
   *   addiu a2,a2,-1
   *   madd  t1,a3        <--- MADD instruction
   *   addiu a0,a0,4
   *   bnez  a2,9d000040 
   *   addiu a1,a1,4
   */

  return (acc >> 31);
  /*
   *   mflo  t3
   *   mfhi  t2
   *   srl   a1,t3,0x1f
   *   sll   a2,t2,0x1
   */
}
  /*
   *   jr ra
   *   or v0,a1,a2
   */

Wired Tipster: iPhone 2 Features Detailed — 3G, GPS, 2xMEM, Thinner, Better Battery and Only $200

The Cult of Mac over on the Wired Blog network is reporting that the upcoming iPhone 2 will be thinner and feature better battery life. Read the details over at their blog.

Microchip Announces Complete Portfolio of 8-, 16- and 32-bit USB Microcontrollers

The PIC18F13K50 and PIC18F14K50 (PIC18F1XK50) are the lowest-cost USB MCUs from Microchip, and build on a broad family of existing USB PIC microcontrollers. They provide a host of features not normally found on inexpensive 8-bit MCUs--enabling the addition of embedded USB into a wide range of applications. The PIC18F1XK50 MCUs include a variety of serial communications interfaces, such as USB 2.0, I2CTM, SPI and USART; enabling them to transfer data between USB and other embedded serial networks.

The 12-member PIC24F USB microcontroller family is the lowest power (2.6 uA standby current) large-memory (up to 256 KB Flash and 16 KB RAM) 16-bit USB microcontroller family in the world. As the only 16-bit microcontroller family with integrated USB 2.0 device, embedded-host, dual-role and OTG functionality, the PIC24F makes it cost effective and easy to add advanced USB features to embedded designs.

The PIC32 microcontroller family members with integrated USB 2.0 OTG functionality bring more performance and memory to embedded designers, while maintaining pin, peripheral and software compatibility with Microchip's 16-bit microcontroller families. With a maximum operating frequency of 80 MHz, up to 512 KB of Flash and 32 KB of RAM, and USB OTG, the PIC32 USB family members enable lower BOM costs and smaller PCB real estate.

Read the full press release here.