Capacitive sensing for ultra-low power applications

  • The PSoC™ 4000T family of Arm® Cortex®-M0+ microcontrollers feature Infineon’s latest 5th generation high-performance CAPSENSE™ technology, providing a 10x higher signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) performance and a 10x lower consumption than the previous generation of the CAPSENSE™ technology. The PSoC™ 4000T features always-on touch sensing capability that enables HMI operation with low active and standby power consumption supporting longer battery life for battery powered products.

  • Offering reliability, robustness, liquid tolerance, and multi-sense capabilities with CAPSENSE(TM) technology, the PSoC™ 4000T series enables a variety of applications including wearable, hearable, and smart connected IoT products that need low power operation and improved performance for optimal user experience. It also offers an upgrade path for PSoC™ 4000 and PSoC™ 4000S based designs to the fifth-generation CAPSENSE™ with software and package compatibility.
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Features:

32-bit MCU subsystem
  • 48-MHz Arm® Cortex®-M0+
  • 64KB flash and 8KB SRAM
MSC (Multi-Sense Convertor) with 5th generation CAPSENSE™
  • “Always-On” sensing enabled ultra-low power technology
  • Reliable operation under harsh conditions, including wet and high moisture
  • Supports self-capacitive and mutual-capicitive sensing technologies
  • Supports up to 16 sensors
Programmable digital blocks
  • Two 16-bit timer/counter/pulse-width modulator (TCPWM) blocks
  • Two serial communication blocks (SCBs) that are configurable as I2C, SPI, or UART
  • I/O subsystem
  • Up to 21 GPIOs, including 16 sensors
CAPSENSE™ touch sensing technology

The latest 5th generation CAPSENSE™ touch-sensing technology enables new power and space-saving designs, making it an ideal solution for wearables and other battery powered smart devices mode operation. With new “always -on” sensing technology, it offers extremely lower power consumption in both active and standby modes enabling a game-changing capability that helps to extend battery life.

The 5th generation CAPSENSE™ technology improves signal-to-noise (SNR) ratio performance by 10 times than previous generations with a unique ratio-metric sensing methodology - enabling smaller sensors for smaller factor designs, adding support for Glove touch, improved proximity detection and gesture control, intuitive sensing such as liquid level detection, touch sensing over metallic surface, and superior noise immunity and smooth design experience in challenging environmental conditions. CAPSENSE™ maintains touch accuracy in wet conditions allowing for fully waterproof touch buttons.

Low-power 1.71 V to 5.5 V operation
  • Deep sleep mode with 6 µA always-on touch sensing
  • Active touch detection and tracking with 200 µA (average)
Fifth-generation CAPSENSE™
  • Best-in-class signal-to-noise ratio and liquid tolerance for capacitive sensing
  • “Always-on” sensing in Deep Sleep mode with hardware-based wake on touch detection for
    ultra-low power operation
  • Autonomous sensing for low power optimization with active touch detection and tracking
  • Advanced proximity sensing with directivity and gesture control
  • Infineon-supplied middleware software makes capacitive sensing design easy
ModusToolbox™ software
  • Comprehensive collection of multi-platform tools and software libraries
  • Includes board support packages (BSPs), peripheral driver library (PDL), and middleware such as CAPSENSE™
  • Industry-standard tool compatibility
PSoC™ 4000T with CAPSENSE™ key benefits:
  • Multi-sensing capabilities
  • 10x higher SNR
  • 10x lower power consumption
  • Wide range of HMI options
  • Long range proximity with gestures
  • Liquid tolerant performance
  • Glove touch
  • Provides a migration path for PSoC™ 4000 and PSoC™ 4000S based designs

Scalable system design with ModusToolbox™

Thanks to the ModusToolbox platform, CAPSENSE™ applications are easily portable from one PSoC™ controller to another, providing for scalability of HMI applications across broad families of product designs.

Infineon supplies a rich set of development resources to support the PSoC 4000T. Development of CAPSENSE™-based systems is backed by the ModusToolbox™ development platform. ModusToolbox software is a modern, extensible development environment supporting a wide range of Infineon microcontroller devices, including the PSoC™ products. Provided as a collection of development tools, libraries, and embedded runtime assets, it provides a flexible and comprehensive development experience. The ModusToolbox package includes desktop programs that enable:

  • The creation of new embedded applications
  • The management of software components
  • Configuration of device peripherals and middleware
  • Compiling, programming, and debugging
Click here to download ModusToolbox™

Videos

Touchless gesture-based user interface using capacitive sensing for next generation HMI
Industrial touchscreen solution powered by Infineon’s 5th generation CAPSENSE