Remote keyless entry (RKE), a feature found on many cars, is typically built around a one-way data link. Adding two-way communication to RKE can expand its potential uses. For example, cars could warn their drivers of low tire pressure or low fuel levels before the drivers even get inside these vehicles.
A single-chip 433.92-MHz industrial-scientific-medical-band (ISM) transceiver, the ASTRX2, provides a low-cost, low-power approach to creating that two-way link. It enables data rates ranging from 1 to 19 kbits/s. A power-saving Sniff Mode wakes up the chip at user-programmed intervals.
The ASTRX2 is being offered as a packaged device an 18-pin SOIC, priced under $2 in million-piece quantities. Yet the ASTRX2's packaged version serves mainly to demonstrate the transceiver's capabilities. Customers designing ASICs can get the ASTRX2 as an embeddable intellectual-property (IP) block. De-pending on the application, the transceiver's transmission frequency can be scaled to any value in the 200- to 700-MHz range.
AMI Semiconductors, tamera_drake@amis.com; www.amis. com/pdf/ASTRX2_FS.pdf.
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