ARM Announces RealView Development Suite 3.1 For Low-Risk Embedded System Software Development

New version provides developers significant improvements in performance and ease of use for the full line of ARM processors

CAMBRIDGE, UK –  Apr. 2, 2007 –  ARM today announced at the Embedded Systems Conference Silicon Valley in San Jose, Calif., the launch of the RealView® Development Suite version 3.1, in a continued commitment to providing best-in-class integrated tools for creating embedded system software for the full line of ARM® processors.

RealView Development Suite 3.1 provides performance improvements and tuning for ARM processor support, most notably by providing better optimization for the full Cortex™ processor family, including the just-announced Cortex-M1 processor, the first ARM product designed specifically for FPGA implementation.

As the first tool suite to support the new Cortex-M1 processor, the RealView Development Suite 3.1 ships with a complete Instruction Set System Model (ISSM) of the Cortex-M1 processor in addition to ISSMs of all previously announced Cortex family processors. This provides software developers out-of-the-box support to create start-up code, firmware and boot operating systems on Cortex family processors ahead of access to actual silicon.

“In the fiercely competitive consumer electronics market, the OEM needs to achieve highly differentiated products with first-time-right complex hardware/software systems integration, while constrained by ever-shrinking market windows,” said Bryn Parry, general manager, Development Systems, ARM. “To achieve this, embedded software developers must be able to quickly create or migrate applications onto hardware platforms that utilize the leading-edge features of ARM intellectual property. The RealView Development Suite 3.1 features significant improvements that enable developers to create higher-performance applications more quickly and easily, with low risk.”

“The RealView Development Suite version 3.1 accelerated the development and testing of our implementation of the ARM Cortex-M1 processor in our Cortex-M1 processor-enabled FPGAs,” said Rich Brossart, vice president, marketing at Actel Corporation. “The combination of the Cortex-M1 processor with the industry-standard RealView compilation tools will offer performance and code density advantages to our customers.”

As with the previous version of the RealView Development Suite, version 3.1 is fully interoperable with the RealView CREATE family of electronic system level (ESL) design tools and models, which speeds time to market for embedded systems developers by enabling concurrent hardware/software development.

Further Code Density Improvements

To further improve code density for the range of ARM processor-based applications, the suite features a new optional microlib C library (a subset of the ISO standard C run time library), which has been minimized in size for microcontroller applications. The microlib C library achieves an amazing 92 percent reduction in run-time library code size.

Ease of Use Improvements

Only the RealView Development Suite 3.1 offers a consistent debug interface for all stages of product development and all ARM architectures, across the entire range of development platforms, such as cycle accurate models, fast virtual prototyping environments, FPGA implementation and test silicon.

For the first time, users developing for applications processors with the high-performance ARM NEON™ SIMD signal processing architecture can separately license an add-on vectorizing compiler that complements the RealView Development Suite 3.1.

The RealView ICE version 3.1 run control unit and its RealView Trace module, used in conjunction with RealView Development Suite 3.1, now offer extended support for the ARM CoreSight™ debug and trace technology. Developers can now configure the CoreSight trace system for multiple trace streams through a single trace port. The CoreSight Serial Wire Debug interface is also supported, which allows silicon designers to reduce the pin count required for debug to just two pins.

Additionally, the open-source Eclipse Integrated Development Environment is now incorporated into the RealView Development Suite. This integration combines Eclipse’s outstanding source code development tools and plug-in framework with the best-in-class ARM compilation and debug technology. Current users of the RealView Development Suite will immediately notice the new Eclipse-based project wizard that automatically and optimally configures the tools for the chosen ARM processor and development board.

Further, intrinsics support in the new suite for ARM DSP instruction set extensions, ETSI functions and TI C55x DSPs means that developers no longer need to write their signal processing operations in assembly language, but rather as C intrinsics. The work of register allocation and scheduling is done automatically by the compiler.

Finally, the RealView Development Suite version 3.1 supports the latest ANSI C99 language standard.

Availability

The RealView Development Suite version 3.1 is currently in use by lead ARM Partners, and will be generally available in Q2 2007 from ARM and its RealView distributor network. For ordering information, please visit http://www.arm.com/products/DevTools/pricing-devtools.html and for information on distributors, please visit http://www.arm.com/products/DevTools/realview_distributors.html.

About ARM

ARM designs the technology that lies at the heart of advanced digital products, from wireless, networking and consumer entertainment solutions to imaging, automotive, security and storage devices. ARM’s comprehensive product offering includes 16/32-bit RISC microprocessors, data engines, graphics processors, digital libraries, embedded memories, peripherals, software and development tools, as well as analog functions and high-speed connectivity products. Combined with the company’s broad Partner community, they provide a total system solution that offers a fast, reliable path to market for leading electronics companies. More information on ARM is available at http://www.arm.com.