Microchip Unveils Advanced Development Kit For High-Quality Digital Audio Applications

Microchip Technology Inc., a leading provider of microcontroller, analog and Flash-IP solutions, today announced a 32-bit microcontroller (MCU)-based development kit for the creation of high-quality, 24-bit audio applications.  The Audio Development Board for PIC32 MCUs features an 80 MIPS PIC32 MCU, a 24-bit Wolfson audio codec, a two-inch color LCD Display, a USB interface, and an onboard microphone.  Supported by Microchip’s free software libraries, the kit provides a perfect solution for the development of speech and audio recording and playback products.  Target applications include docks for portable audio players, home-entertainment systems and automotive sound systems.

The 80-MIPS PIC32MX795F512L MCU on the audio development board features 512 KB Flash and 128 KB RAM, providing plenty of processing power and memory to decode, analyze and play back audio and speech.  Libraries are available for speech recording and playback, as well as MP3 music decoding applications.  Additionally, an audio Sample Rate Conversion (SRC) library for33 kHz, 44.1 kHz and 48 kHz is also supported, which enables developers to reduce component costs for playback solutions.  There are also libraries available for managing the USB interface and driving the on-board color LCD display, which features 16-bit color images.  For those developers who are enrolled in the Apple^®  Made For iPod (MFi) Licensing Program, the kit also interfaces to Microchip’s accessory development platform for iPod^® and iPhone^®.

“The Audio Development Board for PIC32 MCUs offers a complete platform that doesn’t break the budget for high-quality audio development,” said Sumit Mitra, vice president of Microchip’s High-Performance Microcontroller Division.  “The board also includes an interface for use with our accessory development platform for iPod and iPhone, enabling expansion to support these popular devices.”