Freescale Semiconductor’s latest 16-bit microcontroller family aimed at the automotive market with FlexRay comms support also makes use of coprocessor acceleration.

The S12XF family features four MCUs the firm’s XGATE coprocessor. Designed to provide a parallel processing option in the HCS12X family of 16-bit microcontrollers, the XGATE module is a peripheral coprocessor that allows autonomous high-speed data processing and transfers between the MCU’s peripherals and the internal RAM and I/O ports.

It has a built-in Risc core that is able to pre-process the transferred data and perform complex communication protocols. It runs at up to 80MHz in parallel to the S12X CPU, and is programmable in C.

The coprocessor is intended to increase the MCU’s data throughput by lowering the S12X CPU’s interrupt load. 

With on-chip peripherals supporting the FlexRay high speed bus protocol, the 16-bit devices can serve as end nodes for a  range of safety and active driving applications, such as suspension control, active rollover prevention and active braking.
Package options range from the 112-pin low-profile quad flat-pack (LQFP) device to the 10x10mm 64-pin LQFP.