Cypress showed that its latest touch chips can work with thick glovesCypress is a chip company that is now on its 6th generation of touch controller technology. It has a number of major design wins including the Samsung Galaxy 5 mini. The latest generation of chip uses a combination of mutual and self capacitance so that it can support 10mm “hover” functions. The technology can be used to offer proximity sensing without needing a dedicated infrared sensor. The controller also has an extremely low power mode that can be used to “boot up” the full touch features and the system, so a simple double tap can wake the system up. The sensor can also be used for non-display touch and is used on the Samsung Gear S to support the control swipes.
As well as fingers, the latest controllers can work with anything conductive – ordinary pencils and even very thick gloves. Staff told us that noise from chargers is a big problem that causes interference on many phones. There was a good demonstration of how immune the Cypress system is to this kind of noise. We had a quick look at the CapSense technology which is used for the “buttons” that off the surface of the display – such as the back buttons. Finally, the firm told us that tuning its controllers just needs parameters to be set – there is no firmware coding needed.
