Infineon AURIX TC4x
The TC4x is Infineon's latest generation of AURIX™ microcontrollers, designed for advanced automotive applications, including eMobility, Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS), and automotive E/E (Electric/Electronic) architectures. These microcontrollers are built on a 28 nm process and feature the TriCore™ 1.8 instruction set architecture, which includes up to six cores running at speeds up to 500 MHz. This architecture is optimized for high-performance and real-time applications.
Key Features
- High Performance and Scalability: Equipped with a Parallel Processing Unit (PPU), Data Routing Engine (DRE), and other accelerators to enhance AI capabilities and real-time processing.
- Extensive Connectivity: Supports high-speed communication interfaces such as 5 Gbps Ethernet, PCIe, CAN-XL, and 10BASE-T1S Ethernet, providing flexibility and performance for various automotive applications.
- Enhanced Security: Compliant with ISO 21434, the TC4x includes advanced cybersecurity modules and supports safe, over-the-air (SOTA) updates with zero downtime.
- Memory and Storage: Features up to 25 MB of on-chip flash memory, allowing for complex software applications and data storage.
- Real-Time Control: Advanced timers and ADCs (Analog-to-Digital Converters) improve control loops for electric motors and power conversion tasks.
Architecture
System Architecture
TC 1.8P Processor Core (CPU0 ... CPU5)
Parallel Processing Unit (PPU)
The PPU is an implementation of the DesignWare ARC EV71 Processor. The length of the vector registers is flexible and depends on the version. Commercially, 128 or 256 bit vector registers are available. In a pre-series stepping even 512 bit was used.
See Infineon AURIX TC4x Parallel Processing Unit (PPU)
Applications
- eMobility
- ADAS
- Automotive E/E architectures
- Affordable artificial intelligence (AI) applications
emmtrix Tools for AURIX™ TC4x
emmtrix offers several tools for the Infineon AURIX™ TC4x architecture:
- emmtrix Code Vectorizer for vectorizing C code for the Infineon PPU. emmtrix was working together with Infineon already during develop of the TC4x architecture for supporting the PPU and received one of the first series A test boards.
- emmtrix Performance Estimator for estimating the performance of C code written for the Tricore™ CPUs.
emmtrix Code Vectorizer
emmtrix Code Vectorizer (eCV) simplifies programming the Parallel Processing Unit (PPU) on Infineon’s AURIX™ TC4x microcontrollers, enabling significant acceleration of data-parallel applications like sensor fusion or AI inference. By leveraging the PPU, these tasks can be accelerated by factors >10, unlocking the full potential of hardware capabilities.
eCV automates the vectorization process, transforming sequential C code into optimized vectorized code tailored to the AURIX™ TC4x architecture. This includes efficient handling of memory layouts and advanced loop transformations. Developers can simulate and test functionality even without access to target hardware, reducing development time and effort.
With support for Simulink® models, ONNX-based AI workflows, and detailed performance insights through integrated simulators, eCV minimizes the need for manual optimization while maximizing hardware performance.
emmtrix Performance Estimator
emmtrix Performance Estimator (ePE) provides static timing analysis of C code. Compared to simulation or measurement on hardware, static performance analysis can be applied significantly earlier in the development process and will deliver results on average 6 months earlier compared to a typical automotive HIL setup. The analysis only takes a few minutes at most and runs on the developer’s PC independently of any target hardware. Function developers can analyze their runnables or SWCs without the need of a fully integrated program. emmtrix Performance Estimator is fully compatible with Infineon's AURIX™ TC2xx / TC3xx/ TC4x microcontroller family, ensuring precise and reliable performance analysis for embedded systems.
A unique feature is the combination with TargetLink or Embedded Coder generated code. Without any measurement overhead, our static performance estimation can analyze even the smallest code snippets. This allows us to map the timing analysis to Simulink blocks, giving function developers insight into the timing behavior of their models.
ePE offers three accuracy levels:
- analysis of C code
- generically compiler-optimized code
- assembly code from the target compiler.
Method 1 yields results with minimum effort while method 3 takes the timing of the processor pipeline into account. All methods offer excellent reliability when tracking the tendency of changes in software runtimes e.g. when used in a continuous integration environment.
Services
See Also
- Infineon AURIX TC4x Parallel Processing Unit (PPU)
- Infineon AURIX TC3xx
- TriCore Instruction Set Architecture