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UNI/O technology saves pins on low pin

count microcontrollers
By brumbarchris
Created 09/11/2008 - 21:14

Programming EEPROM i2c low-pin-count Microchip microcontroller pin protocol uni/o

Do you need to save pins in low pin count microcontrollers? UNI/O protocol is the answer.
The purpose of this article is to present a few attributes of serial EEPROMs featuring this new
technology, also providing a short insight in how they should be used with a microcontroller.
Their very existence is probably owned to the very low pin-count microcontrollers already present
on the market. If one thinks that a PIC10 series device only has 6 pins (out of which one is VCC
and another GND) it is obvious that using a one, two or three pin interface to connect to an
external EEPROM is not unimportant, and this decision can affect the design from a very early
stage.

For the hardware engineer, just having a comparative look at the pin functions of such an
EEPROM will make him feel better, since the PCB layout can be significantly less complex with
less tracks to route in a possibly very populated area of the board:

Not only the number of traces is reduced, but also the number of additional discrete components
is lower, as the usual pull-ups required on the I2C lines for example are inexistent in a UNI/O
based design:

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And in order to make things even more attractive, Microchip provides this type of memories in a
space-saving 3-pin SOT package which is significantly smaller than 8-pin packages. Additional
facilities include: industrial and automotive qualified devices, 1.8V to 5.5V supply range, low
current consumption (active current: 1mA) and 1 million guaranteed erase/write cycles.

Having a proprietary bus protocol (like UNI/O) in your design also brings you some advantages
as being a tested and proven protocol. The UNI/O Bus is an asynchronous single I/O bus that
uses the Manchester Encoding scheme to multiplex the data and clock on to a single I/O (SCIO).
With data stream Manchester-encoded the UNI/O device synchronizes to the MCU data rate.
The clock signal is extracted by the receiver to correctly decode the data value of each bit. The
bit period is determined by the master and forms an integral part of the communication between
the master and the receiver. It is with this bit period that clock and data can be extracted.

Of course, having to do so many things using a single communication data line might be fine
from a hardware point of view, but it might not be the first choice of a software developer. As we
must remember that the target for these special EEPROM devices is to be used with the
smallest available microcontrollers which also happened to have quite small program and data
memories. So although at a project level some reduced Bill of Material cost might be achieved,
the software effort to develop the “drivers” for writing to these memories might overcome it.
Sometimes, with extremely small program memory micros it is not even possible to squeeze in
the code for such an elaborated protocol and the project might have to move on to a larger and
more expensive device (which is exactly what the use of these memories is meant to preempt).

Indeed, the protocol is without doubt more complicated than on a regular I2C, SPI or Microwire
bus. It is made up fast sequences of headers, addresses, data and acknowledgments from both
the master (microcontroller) and the slave (EEPROM). The biggest disadvantage is that due to
the existence of the bit period (TE) it is not possible to stop a transmission in the middle of one
byte, when for instance, the microcontroller might have to service an urgent interrupt request.
For older busses, this feature is generally ensured using a HOLD pin, or by using
microcontrollers with dedicated internal SPI or I2C modules. However, the low pin-count devices

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meant to be used with UNI/O bus protocol must not be expected to provide such hardware
features. Low cost means not only few pins, but also means more software developing effort.

As such, after a brief encounter with the new technology by which Microchip surely intends to
conquer yet another share of the market, one can easily spot at a glance the pros and cons of
using these EEPROM memories. Of course they will find their place in some applications (the
bus would not have been introduced without a thorough market research) but their real success
will only be measured by the degree of which other major EEPROM/microcontroller
manufacturers will be wiling to invest in similar devices (of course with the higher cost of paying
the right tribute to the bus proprietor).

Further useful information about this type of products may be found on the microchip website:
Microchip
And if you are really in a hurry and want to start taking advantage of the new available features,
just download a datasheet, for the 11AAxxx memory family:1K-16K UNI/O™ Serial EEPROM
Family Data Sheet

Trademarks

Source URL: http://dev.emcelettronica.com/unio-technology-saves-pins-low-pin-count-microcontrollers

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