Altia DeepScreen Leverages On-Chip Resources of STM32 F1, F4 and F7 Series MCUs to Deliver Unmatched GUI Performance

Today, Altia announces key wins at device manufacturers with STM32 and Altia GUI development software for deploying production embedded displays. These wins include three global medical companies and two Tier 1 automotive suppliers. Additionally, Altia with STM32 F Series is currently in the final approval stages with many industrial device manufacturers’ programs. The F Series is a low cost family of processors purpose-built for production embedded displays. Altia’s support of a broad range of the STM32 lineup, including the F1 Series, F4 Series and new F7 Series, has been key to the adoption of this combined solution.

The STM32 Series MCUs supported by Altia offer a range of memory and processing power.

  • STM32 F1 Series – ARM® Cortex®-M3 processor; 72 MHz
  • STM32 F4 Series – ARM® Cortex®-M4 processor; 180 MHz; includes Chrom-ART Accelerator™
  • STM32 F7 Series – ARM® Cortex®-M7 processor; 216 MHz; includes Chrom-ART Accelerator™

Because of Altia’s carefully architected DeepScreen code generation targets for the STM32 MCUs, Altia is able to take full advantage of the on-chip resources of these microcontrollers to deliver top notch GUIs – even with limited RAM.

Unlike other GUI development solutions, Altia-generated graphics require no large, mysterious black box engines or slow, interpreted languages. Instead, Altia DeepScreen graphics code generator provides direct, native C code for GUIs. All source code is provided by DeepScreen, thereby simplifying certification. Additionally, Altia generates code only for the GUI assets needed, which saves memory, boosts performance and means less code to validate and test.

The Altia Layer Manager takes full advantage of the dual-layer architecture of the STM32 F4 and F7 Series, offering unparalleled graphical use and control. This makes speedy, layer-enabled hardware alpha blending possible. Additionally, the Layer Manager offloads the chip’s CPU from having to do work, which further boosts performance.

Furthermore, Altia leverages the on-chip Chrom-ART Accelerator™ of the F4 and F7 Series for best graphics performance. Developers using Altia with STM32 have experienced an improvement in frame rate of 90%.

Altia has a strong legacy for success in medical, automotive, industrial and consumer markets – and its graphical user interface development software is used by companies worldwide to get first class displays onto the lowest cost, best performing hardware. With Altia Design, the GUI editor and centerpiece of Altia’s tool chain, users create custom graphics from scratch or use assets from tools like Adobe Photoshop to draw their GUIs, create animation, define behavior and optimize user experience. Once complete, Altia DeepScreen generates pure C source code for the Altia design model that can be deployed onto a wide array of low- to high-power processors from STMicroelectronics and other industry-leading silicon providers – Freescale, Renesas, NXP, Spansion, Cypress Semiconductor, Texas Instruments and more.

To see Altia DeepScreen code generation at work on the STM32F429 Discovery Board, visit www.altia.com/disco. To learn more about Altia’s GUI development support for the STM32 F Series, email us at [email protected].

About Altia

Altia, Inc. is a software company that provides graphical user interface design and development tools that can be used from concept to final product code. Altia was founded in 1991 and its customers include Continental Automotive, Smiths Medical, Renault, Fiat, Medtronic, MTA, Johnson Controls, Rolls-Royce, DAF Trucks, Frazer-Nash, Diehl AKO Stiftung & Co. and hundreds of other leading manufacturers.

For more information about Altia, visit www.altia.com or contact Altia’s worldwide corporate headquarters at +1 719-598-4299.

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