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Portable Navigation Device

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"Boot from Managed NAND is rapidly gaining support from the storage vendor community. This QuickLogic solution is extending the market for our NAND Flash by enabling it to be used in more product designs such as portable Navigation Devices (PND), portable Media Players (PMP), smartphones, Ultra Mobile Devices (UMD), etc." says Rob McKenzie, Micron’s Senior NAND Flash Product Manager. "Now, Managed NAND Flash is not just for high-density data storage, but it can also be used as bootable system memory."

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Introduction

The market for GPS navigation systems has seen an exponential growth the last few years ignited by the growth of the subsegment called portable Navigation Devices (PNDs). The PND market has evolved from very basic navigation functionality to adopting the latest features of the consumer electronics market, including multimedia functionality. PND designers need to create new and differentiated products by adding the features that consumers demand while simultaneously addressing the market needs of rapid development time, and lowest Bill of Materials (BOM) cost.

The PND market’s adoption of multimedia-rich content as well as addition of 3D maps and increased Points-of-Interest (POI) has led to unique challenges in storage, feature integration and technology convergence. At an architecturural level, this trend results in more and more peripherals to be connected to the application processors that run the operating system (OS) and application software. Unfortunately, application processors have a predefined set of interfaces and typically cannot be modified as fast as the market requirements change.

To solve this dilemma, QuickLogic has developed a broad variety of host controllers around the most common storage, networking, video and other high speed peripheral interface technologies used in PNDs. These include USB 2.0 OTG with PHY, SD/SDIO/MMC, IDE, CE-ATA, NAND/Managed NAND, High Speed UARTs, and PCI.

Block Diagram


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PND Architecture with QuickLogic CSSP

Trend

  • New high capacity storage technologies for increased, cost-effective storage – Secure Digital High Capacity (SDHC) cards, Managed NAND and CE-ATA Hard Disk Drives
  • Hi-Speed USB and Bluetooth 2.0 will be found in nearly every navigation device
  • Broadband data access with HSDPA/HSUPA, Wi-Fi and WiMAX
  • Mobile TV is gaining momentum with varying local standards – DVB-H, T-DMB, ISDB-T and MediaFLO

Challenges

  • Increased storage needs due to 3D maps, increased POIs and high video content
  • Demand for multiple high speed wireless interfaces for high speed download of digital content, email and web browsing, and better user experience with services provided by navigation companies such as live traffic monitoring, downloading maps on the fly and location based services
  • Content protection of copyrighted materials to play movies from SD and SDHC cards
  • Poor image quality and requirement for increasing backlight reduce battery life

Solution

  • QuickLogic supports a broad spectrum of storage choices including CE-ATA, SD/SDHC/MMC cards and Managed NAND with booting capability
  • QuickLogic provides both Hi-Speed USB 2.0 and SDIO 2.0 for high speed data interface for wired and wireless connectivity
  • QuickLogic’s USB and Mobile TV solutions support On-The-Go and can be used as a device or a host, depending how it is connected
  • Image enhancement to improve picture quality and save battery life by lowering backlight requirements when watching video and Mobile TV

Use Cases


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PND with Managed NAND (including boot capability)


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PND with USB 2.0 OTG, SD Card and/or Managed NAND (including boot capability), Bluetooth 2.0, and Mobile TV

Customer Success Story

Improved PND Architecture with QuickLogic CSSP

Overview

The two figures above outline both the original and modified architecture for a PND using a generic Application Processor, and with the need to boot from Managed NAND.

Challenge

The Managed NAND device connects to the application processor through the SD/MMC interface. Since most application processors in the market today do not support booting from SD- and/or MMC-based Managed NAND devices, designers are forced to use an additional flash memory device to initialize, or boot up, the system. The most common choice today for this memory is NOR flash. However, requiring the use of two flash memory devices for this design consumes valuable board space and adds to the BOM cost – non-trivial issues in a market where price pressure and product miniaturization are key.

Most application processors have only 1 or 2 SD ports. Most new PND devices need both a Secure Digital High Capacity (SDHC) memory card slot for user data (e.g. MP3 files) and a Managed NAND device for maps and point-of-interest. In order to use both ports at the same time, designers need to use a multiplexor to connect both the SDHC Memory and the Managed NAND device on the same board. Due to sourcing issues, designers also desire to have the ability to connect to both SD and MMC-based Managed NAND devices.

QuickLogic Solution

QuickLogic’s CSSP approach enabled this PND manufacturer to directly address the three design challenges: BOM cost, required PCB space and having the flexibility to support booting from any SD or MMC-based Managed NAND device. QuickLogic’s CSSP removed the NOR flash and the multiplexor and replaced them with one device. Furthermore, QuickLogic provided a full-featured high speed SD 2.0 compliant SD/MMC host controller port to enable the application processors SD controller to connect to only one device – the SD memory card expansion slot. This reduces the complexity of the software and hardware architecture significantly.

Results

As a result of using the QuickLogic CSSP, this PND manufacturer was able to provide a better user experience and increase the performance by removing the need for the multiplexer between Managed NAND and SD memory card, save board space through integration and solve sourcing issues by having the ability to connect to any Managed NAND device.

 

Documentation

Solution Platform Briefs

ArcticLink Solution Platform Brief PDF 580.7KB (3/19/2007)
PolarPro Programmable Connectivity Solution Platform PDF 634.2KB (6/20/2007)

Solution Guides

QuickLogic’s Complete Connectivity Solution for Managed NAND (Rev. A) PDF 643.5KB (5/14/2007)

White Papers

Customer Specific Standard Products Ease Mobile Device Design (Rev. C) PDF 994.8KB (9/18/2007)
Increasing Boot Options with Managed NAND (Rev. D) PDF 704.2KB (9/21/2007)

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