Texas instruments announced a new line of microcontrollers today that it claims offers a breakthrough in performance while requiring a miniscule amount of power. The microcontrollers are from the MSP430F5xx family and offer up to 25MHz of performance with as 160 µA/MHz of power needed.

The controllers will enable portable devices to have longer battery life, additional memory, and on-chip peripherals. The peripherals include things like RF, USB, encryption and LCD interfaces. TI says that the microcontroller will be seen in devices like consumer electronics, home automation, and more.

"The conflicting demands of increased performance, functionality and energy efficiency are the biggest challenges facing the industry today," notes Max Baron, principal analyst, In-Stat. "As designers strive to do more with less, the new MSP430F5xx MCU generation will help reduce the power consumed by existing applications while enabling new designs requiring very low power."

Via Texas Insturments