DS14285/DS14287

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NONVOLATILE RAM

The 114 general-purpose nonvolatile RAM bytes are not dedicated to any special function within the

DS14285/DS14287. They can be used by the processor program as nonvolatile memory and are fully

available during the update cycle.

The DS14285/DS14287 can also provide additional nonvolatile RAM. This is accomplished through the

in the case of the DS14285) and battery-backup controller to make a standard CMOS SRAM nonvolatile

during power-fail conditions. During power-fail, the DS14285/DS14287 automatically write-protects the

the DS14285/DS14287 and an external SRAM is illustrated in Figure 3.

Figure 3. External SRAM Interface to the DS14285/DS14287 RTC

INTERRUPTS

The RTC plus RAM includes three separate, fully automatic sources of interrupt for a processor. The

alarm interrupt can be programmed to occur at rates from once per second to once per day. The periodic

interrupt can be selected for rates from 500 ms to 122

µs. The update-ended interrupt can be used to

indicate to the program that an update cycle is complete. Each of these independent interrupt conditions is

described in greater detail in other sections of this text.

The processor program can select which interrupts, if any, are going to be used. Three bits in Register B

enable the interrupts. Writing a logic 1 to an interrupt-enable bit permits that interrupt to be initiated when

at an active level, although the interrupt initiating the event may have occurred much earlier. As a result,

there are cases where the program should clear such earlier initiated interrupts before first enabling new

interrupts. When an interrupt event occurs, the relating flag bit is set to logic 1 in Register C. These flag

bits are set independent of the state of the corresponding enable bit in Register B. The flag bit can be used

in a polling mode without enabling the corresponding enable bits. The interrupt flag bit is a status bit

which software can interrogate as necessary. When a flag is set, an indication is given to software that an

interrupt event has occurred since the flag bit was last read; however, care should be taken when using the