ARM Announces RealView Development Suite Professional Tools For Mobile Applications

All-in-one development tool enables software design before silicon

CAMBRIDGE, UK – Feb. 11, 2008 – ARM today announced at Mobile World Congress, Barcelona, Spain, the launch of the RealView® Development Suite 3.1 Professional tools that brings together four key technologies and supports the latest ARM® technology-based processors that power the mobile world. RealView Development Suite 3.1 Professional is designed to support the latest high-performance ARM processors, such as the Cortex™-A8 processor, and includes vectorizing compilation for the NEON™ media processing engine which can increase the performance of multimedia applications by more than 200 percent from standard C code.

RealView Development Suite 3.1 Professional combines four major RealView technologies: the industry-leading RealView Development Suite; the innovative RealView Profiler; the ultra-fast Real-Time System Models; and state-of-the-art NEON vectorizing compiler technology.

RealView Development Suite 3.1 Professional also provides full integration with the RealView ESL tools enabling developers to use a single set of tools from architectural exploration, through system-on-chip design, system bring-up, and the deployment of hardware and virtual platforms. The inclusion of fast Real time System models enables developers to create complete software systems before silicon is available accelerating the mobile handset design cycle by up to six months.

“With intense competition in the mobile space, OEMs and silicon providers are looking for software tools that reduce time-to-market. RealView Development Suite 3.1 Professional enables ARM Partners to take full advantage of ARM processor technology and allows software development and tuning to start far in advance of silicon availability,” said John Cornish, VP marketing, System Design Division, ARM. “The RealView Development Suite 3.1 Professional tools provide a powerful head start in optimizing mobile system designs.”

“Using ARM RealView Development Suite Professional has made it possible for On2 to adapt our market leading video software codecs to NEON technology without needing access to hardware from silicon vendors,” said Mika Hakala, general manager - Embedded Solutions, On2 Technologies. “With this approach, we are able to provide optimized solutions in the same time frame as silicon vendors are providing hardware platforms.”

“ARM RealView Development Suite Professional with its built-in vectorizing compiler makes it possible for our OMAP™ 3 platform customers and third-party developers to take full advantage of the powerful Cortex-A8 processor and the NEON media processing engine,” said Avner Goren, worldwide director, strategic marketing Texas Instruments. “OMAP 3 application processors deliver the most compelling, multimedia-rich applications that help handset manufacturers differentiate themselves in the market while attracting users to next-generation devices and services.”

“Symbian looks forward to using key tools in the RealView Development Suite 3.1 Professional, that will enable Symbian OS to take full advantage of next-generation ARM processors,” said Mike Whittingham, VP Ecosystem Development, Symbian. “We are continuously collaborating with ARM to deliver the latest technology and compelling development experiences to the Symbian ecosystem worldwide."

Optimized performance for mobile applications

RealView Development Suite 3.1 Professional tools include a Real-Time System Model of the Cortex-A8 processor that incorporates the NEON advanced SIMD unit. The performance of this ultra-fast model is equivalent to silicon running at 200MHz or more, on a typical host PC, which makes it the ideal tool for developing mobile applications ahead of silicon availability. Together with the cycle timings delivered by the RealView Profiler, this makes it possible for software developers to obtain a thorough understanding of performance bottlenecks and optimize their application months before target hardware is complete.

The integration of the RealView Profiler enables non-intrusive analysis of code, resulting in a highly-optimized system. Using the RealView Profiler on existing applications has enabled software developers to improve performance by 30 percent and at the same time reduce ROM size by 30 percent in a matter of hours. The RealView Profiler also enables software developers to analyse code coverage in order to achieve higher software quality and reliability.

The state-of-the-art NEON vectorizing compiler enables software developers to take advantage of the NEON advanced SIMD media processing extensions using standard ISO C and standard ISO C++ code. This can improve the performance of individual kernels by up to 400 percent and complete media applications by more than 200 percent.

Designing software for future handsets today

RealView Development Suite 3.1 Professional provides mobile developers with a convenient all-in-one solution, significantly reducing time-to-market. It enables software design for ARM processor-based complex SoCs, and features platform OS and RTOS support, simulation, debug and device awareness, including the ARM926EJ-STM, ARM1136JF-STM, ARM1176JZF-STM processors, as well as the high-performance Cortex-A8 processor. The RealView Development Suite 3.1 Professional tools also support the Faraday FA626TE processor.

Availability

The RealView Development Suite 3.1 Professional tools will be available at the end of February 2008. Ordering information is available at http://www.arm.com/products/DevTools/pricing-devtools.html 

Information on distributors is available at http://www.arm.com/products/DevTools/realview_distributors.html.

About ARM

ARM designs the technology that lies at the heart of advanced digital products, from wireless, networking and consumer entertainment solutions to imaging, automotive, security and storage devices. ARM’s comprehensive product offering includes 16/32-bit RISC microprocessors, data engines, graphics processors, digital libraries, embedded memories, peripherals, software and development tools, as well as analog functions and high-speed connectivity products. Combined with the company’s broad Partner community, they provide a total system solution that offers a fast, reliable path to market for leading electronics companies. More information on ARM is available at http://www.arm.com.