STM32U5 Cortex-M33 MCU Gets More Performance, Advanced Security

The first STM32 MCU supported Arm Cortex-M33 core was the ultra-low-power STM32L5 microcontroller, and therefore the company is now following with the STM32U5 series also designed for smart applications including personal medical devices, home automation, and more.

The new STM32U5 MCU family features a higher 160 MHz clock speed, up to 2048 KB flash, up to 786 KB RAM, a 2D graphics accelerator, several peripherals are upgraded, and a brand new autonomous mode lets DMA and peripherals keep working while most of the device sleeps so as to save power. STM32U5 MCUs also have integrated hardware security measures, and are manufactured by employing a 40nm process, the most advanced process suitable for microcontrollers.

Similar to the STM32L5 family, The STM32U5 has two product lines mostly differing in their security features:

• STM32U575 with 1024 to 2048 KB flash memory, and 786 KB RAM
• STM32U585 with 2048 KB flash memory, 786 KB RAM, with extra security measures including AES-128/256, PKA, and on-the-fly decryption (OTFDEC).

STM32U5 Features:

• MCU Core – Arm Cortex-M33 Armv8-M core clocked at up to 160 MHz with FPU, Arm TruztZone
• Memory – 768 KB RAM
• Flash – 1024KB to 2048KB flash
• Chrom-ART accelerator (DMA2D) for 2D graphics
• Mathematical co-processor –
  • CORDIC for trigonometric functions
    acceleration,
  • FMAC (filter mathematical accelerator)
• ST ART Accelerator – 8-KB instruction cache allowing 0-wait-state execution from Flash and external memories: up to 160 MHz, MPU, 240 DMIPS, and DSP
• Peripherals
  
  • USB – 1x USB OTG 2.0 full-speed controller, 1x USB type-C/PD controller
  • 2x analog-to-digital converter (ADC), one 14-bit, one 12-bit both up to 2.5 Mbps
  • 2x 12-bit digital-to-analog converters (DAC)
  • 2x ultra-low-power comparators
  • 2x op amps with external or internal follower routing and programmable-gain amplifier (PGA) capability.
  • 6x USART, 3x SPI, 4x I2C, 1x CAN-FD
  • 16- and 32-bit timers
  • 2x SAI + audio PLL
  • 2x SDMMC interfaces
  • Up to 24 capacitive touch sensing
• Security – Arm TrustZone, flexible software isolation, secure boot, key storage, and hardware cryptographic accelerators:
  
  • AES encryption and Public Key Authorization (PKA) are now hardware resistant to side-channel attacks by Differential Power Analysis (DPA)
  • Hardware Unique Key (HUK) for secure data storage
  • Active tamper detection
  • Internal monitoring that can erase secret data in the event of perturbation attacks helps meet the PCI Security Standards Council (PCI SSC) requirements for Point Of Sales (POS) applications.
• Power Features / Consumption
  
  • Operating Voltage – 1.71 to 3.6 V
  • Embedded SMPS step down converter (optional)
  • UCPD controller compliant with USB Type-C Rev. 2.0 and USB Power Delivery Rev. 3.0 specifications.
• Packages – Available in LQFP48, UFQFPN48, LQFP64, WLSCP90, LQFP100, UFBGA132, LQFP144, and UFBGA169
• Temperature Range: -40°C to +85°C or -40°C to +125°C

The options for flash capacity, HW crypto, and packages mean there are 15 different STM32U5 microcontrollers, albeit the parts with only 1MB flash will only become available later in Q3 2021.

Software And STM32U5 Development Board

The new STM32U5 microcontrollers support the STM32Cube software suite that has Azure RTOS (aka ThreadX), STM32CubeMX, and STM32CubeIDE tools, code examples are included as well. Third-party IDEs like IAR Embedded Workbench and MDK-ARM are also supported.

Also, STMicro is offering an STM32U5 evaluation/development board with B-U585I-IOT02A Discovery Kit, based on the STM32U585AI microcontroller (169-pin UFBGA, 2MB flash, HW crypto). Also referred to as the “STM32U5 IoT Discovery Kit”, the board will have a Wi-Fi and Bluetooth module, microphones, a temperature and humidity sensor, and a slew of other sensors.

The board also comes with 512-Mbit octal-SPI flash memory, 64-Mbit octal-SPI PSRAM, 256-Kbit I2C EEPROM, ARDUINO Uno V3, STMod+, and Pmod expansion connectors, along with an expansion connector for a camera module, and STLink-V3E embedded debugger.

Availability

STM32U5 MCUs are sampling now, but only to “lead customers”, and full production is predicted for September 2021. The STM32U5 IoT Discovery Kit are going to be available for order later this year, but the price has not been announced yet. Additional details can be found in the press release, and product pages for the microcontroller family and development board.

Source: CNXSoftware