August 19, 2013. Newark element14 has announced it will stock the two new Hercules LaunchPad development kits from Texas Instruments. The new platforms have been created to allow design engineers to explore the TI Hercules Safety MCUs and evaluate the MCUs’ safety features specifically around the IEC 61508 and ISO 26262 functional safety standards.
The development kits deliver scalable performance, connectivity, memory, and safety features for the TMS570 and RM4x series of ARM Cortex-based MCUs. The low-cost platforms for the TI Hercules Safety MCUs are available through Newark element14 in North America (LaunchXL-RM42 and LaunchXL-TMS57004) at $19.99 each. The platforms are also available from Farnell element14 in Europe (LaunchXL-RM42 and LaunchXL-TMS57004) and element14 in the Asia Pacific region (LaunchXL-RM42 and LaunchXL-TMS57004).
The quick-launch evaluation kit contains the development board, USB cable, and documentation. On-board emulation and included Hercules Safety MCU demos allow for exploration of advanced safety features. The kit also contains a BoosterPack expansion header and additional footprint for MCU pin access. Powered by USB, the board integrates an onboard XDS100v2 JTAG emulator, LED lights, a light sensor, and SCI to PC serial communication port for design flexibility. It also includes software for evaluation, including Hercules MCU safety demos with downloadable host graphical user interface (GUI) to select and run the demos.
David Shen, group CTO at Newark element14 parent company Premier Farnell, said, “The TI MCU LaunchPads are hugely popular on the element14 community and give our design engineers an easy route to start designing new applications. The new evaluation kits expand the LaunchPad platform into Hercules Safety MCUs that target a wide variety of applications including medical, industrial automation, and automotive.”
Dev Pradhan, Hercules Safety MCU Product Line Manager at Texas Instruments, said, “This is the latest addition to the TI MCU LaunchPad ecosystem. The flexibility of the boards gives design engineers greater functionality and will help speed up the design process and allow them to explore the potential of TI’s Hercules Safety MCUs. We are proud to be working with Premier Farnell for their expertise in electronics design and global outreach to a community of developers.”