Analog Devices’ new Blackfin BF50x family for industrial applications offers impressive performance and features at a low price.  The family boasts a 400 MHz DSP/MCU core, up to 4MB of optional on-board flash, and optional dual SAR 12-bit ADCs.  Pricing starts at just $4.50 for the BF504, which comes without flash or the ADCs.  You can step up to the BF04F with integrated flash for $6.50, and add both flash and ADCs for $10.60 with the BF506F.  The new processors target compute-intense applications including renewable energy inverters, uninterruptable power supplies (UPS), advanced motor control, and smart metering, and advanced sensing.

All three family members offer impressive performance.  Competing processors typically run at 200 MHz or less, so the BF50x has a major advantage in raw MIPS.  (Some flash-less competitors run faster than 200 MHz.  For example, TI’s Delfino C2834x processors run at 300 MHz.)  The Blackfin architecture also offers excellent signal processing performance, and in this area it far outpaces competing MCUs.  In fact, Berkeley Design Technology’s DSP benchmark analysis shows that the BF504 has the best performance per dollar of any fixed-point processor the company has tested see this PDF).

The ADC’s performance is also notable.  The dual-SAR ADC’s 11+ effective number of bits (ENOB puts it well ahead of the competition, which typical offers 10.1 ENOB.   This ENOB advantage makes the BF50x a good choice for high-precision control.

The BF50x also introduces a new peripheral, the ADC Control Module (ACM).  This module synchronizes ADC sampling times with external events.  This feature enhances performance by removing the synchronization overhead from the Blackfin core, freeing up those cycles for other work.

The BF50x also benefit from its unusually large on-board flash.  Competing parts in the same price range often have 512 KB of flash or less.  In contrast, the Bf50x offers a generous 4 MB of flash.  The flash is executable, eliminating the need for external SDRAM in many applications—thus saving both cost and board space.

The BF50x processors are supported by a $199 EZ-KIT Lite development kit.  ADI also offers a $150 emulator, the ADZS-IC-100B.  It is worth noting that this low-cost emulator contains a Blackfin processor—thus you can access you Blackfin-based development board through a Blackfin-based emulator.  The emulator is a convincing proof point that the Blackfin offers big performance at a small price.

The new Blackfin BF50x processors, the EZ-KIT Lite, and the emulator are all available now.  For more information on the BF50x, see.   For more information, see the press release and the Blackfin BF50x landing page, and the Blackfin BF50x video page (the overview video is below).