The Digital Communications Division of Rockwell International Corp has announced a family of V.32/V.32bis modem chip sets that support data, facsimile and voice. The products fall into two categories: data pumps – the RC96DPL and RC144DPL, and the same products integrated with controller firmware – the RC96ACL and RC144ACL. They incorporate protocols including enhanced AT commands and MNP 10 for operation over cellular. The pumps are available in a single 68-pin PLCC package or a device set consisting of 80 and 100-pin PQFPs supporting integrated circuit card format modem designs. The RC 144DPL has a maximum speed of 14.4Kbps (V.32bis) and 14.4Kbps send and receive Group III facsimile (V.17), while the RC96DPL has a maximum speed of 9,600bps. Included in the pumps is an Adaptive Pulse Coded Modulation voice coderdecoder for digital storage of spoken messages, and V.26bis for banking terminal applications. One of the features being pushed is the low power consumption of the new products; the data pumps consume 390mW in normal and 10mW in sleep mode, while the other two products are said to use less than 500mW, meaning that they are to be pitched at low power requirements for the portable market. The ACL products – the ones with controller firmware – consist of a data pumps connected to the host via a V.24 serial interface, and a Rockwell C29 microcontroller which performs the general modem and features functions including enhanced AT commands; MNP 10; V.25bis; V.42 and MNP 2-4 error correction; V.42bis; MNP 5 data compression; EIA/TIA 578 Class 1 and Class 2 facsimile standard; and Calling Number Delivery or Caller ID detect. Also incorporated is the Rockwell AT+V command set extension, designed to support speech messaging, which has been submitted for standardisation. There is worldwide call progress tone detection, and a blacklisting function. In quantities of 10,000, the RC96DPL is $83; the RC144DPL is $98, as is the RC96ACL; the RC144ACL costs $113. Samples of all four are available now, and volume shipments are to begin next month.
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