Time and power performance study on 8-bit microcontrollers

In the electronics world embedded systems are everywhere, many of which are based on microcontrollers. Throughout the design cycle of such systems, the microcontroller’s performance is always critical for the project’s success. But what does performance represent for a microcontroller and how can we measure it? This paper presents an analysis of different test algorithms executed on a series of 8-bit microcontrollers. The test algorithms are represented by test sequences that are carefully designed in order to reflect real life scenarios. This study takes into consideration two performance aspects: the execution time, also known as time performance and the power consumption, also known as power performance. At the end of this paper there is a performance comparison between multiple 8-bit microcontrollers.