What this Stellaris MCU brings to the board
The LM3S9790-IQC80-C1 is a Texas Instruments Stellaris ARM Cortex-M3 MCU running at 80 MHz, packing 128 KB of Flash and 64 KB of RAM. It carries a full connectivity set: Ethernet MAC+PHY, USB OTG, CAN, and multiple serial interfaces including I²C, SPI, UART, and IrDA.
80 MHz Cortex-M3 — what it means for throughput
The 80 MHz core clock on this Cortex-M3 handles protocol stacks and control loops without a separate network coprocessor. Ethernet and USB OTG run concurrently with the application code; the integrated DMA engine offloads peripheral data movement. For designs that previously needed an MCU plus an external Ethernet controller, this part collapses the BOM.
Obsolete — sourcing reality and the RFQ path
Memory and I/O budget for firmware and expansion
128 KB of Flash and 64 KB of RAM give room for a real-time OS, Ethernet stack, and application logic on mid-complexity projects. The 60 GPIOs in the 100-LQFP package leave headroom for parallel LCD interfaces, external memory via EBI/EMI, or multiple sensor banks.