PSoC

PSoC stands for Programmable System-on-Chip. It is a family of microcontrollers developed by Cypress Semiconductor, now part of Infineon Technologies. What distinguishes PSoC devices from traditional microcontrollers is their highly flexible and reconfigurable analog and digital peripheral subsystem.

Instead of having fixed hardware peripherals, PSoC devices allow designers to create custom peripheral configurations using on-chip analog and digital building blocks. These blocks, such as timers, counters, pulse-width modulators, analog-to-digital converters, and operational amplifiers, can be interconnected and customized through the PSoC Creator integrated development environment (IDE). This level of customization allows for tailored hardware solutions, enabling designers to optimize for specific application requirements in terms of power consumption, performance, and cost.

PSoC devices integrate a central processing unit (CPU), typically an ARM Cortex-M core, along with flash memory for program storage and SRAM for data memory. The flexible peripheral architecture makes PSoC suitable for a wide range of applications, including industrial control, consumer electronics, automotive systems, and the Internet of Things (IoT). The ability to modify hardware at a granular level offers significant advantages in prototyping and product development, allowing for rapid iteration and optimization of designs.