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5. Texas Instruments Electronics Online Challenge

The Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1 2012 Edition tablet is the device for the Texas Instruments Electronics Online Challenge.  The tablet was the most interesting device on the preferred list of deconstructing devices I had lying around. Throughout the deconstruction I did not find any Texas Instrument components.  I did find out multitudes of information about the inside of my tablet. I learned there are different types of touchscreens such as resistive, acoustic, surface capacitive, optical imaging, infrared, etc.  From my research I have discovered my device uses surface capacity which means the screen pinpoints wherever there is a voltage drop caused by the contact of a material with an electric charge with the constant electrostatic field within the screen.  The screen is controlled by an Atmel mxT16645 chip on the motherboard.  Along with the tablet came an S pen to use as a stylist for more precision or if gloves are being worn.  The input of the S pen is controlled by a Wacom w8008 chip on the motherboard. Two loud speaker modules are each connected to the motherboard by a single wire.   The loud speaker modules are controlled by a Wolfson Audio WM1811AF Audio CODEC chip, which enables multi-channel audio.  A CODEC is a program or device that decompresses received data and compresses data to enable faster transmission.  The device has a Samsung Exynos 4Quad 1.4GHz processor with integrated 3D graphics.  All data must pass through the processor for processing before any functions are carried out.  The semi processor used is the STMicroelectronics 811cN237 Samsung Semiconductor.  I was quite surprised to discover that there were no TI components in this tablet, but I did learn how each chip controlled a part of the tablet and the specifications of how that task was performed.