In 2020, one of Germany’s leading B2B electronics magazines, Elektronik, conducted a reader test with SEGGER’s development environment Embedded Studio. This kind of test lets readers apply to receive the product free of charge, to test it according to a previously defined set of criteria and give their feedback and a rating.
The products’ manufacturers had no influence on the rating. This made the results authentic for two reasons:
- The testers were real experts who use comparable products in their day-to-day development work.
- Unlike tests done by magazine editorial staff, these testers had no financial incentives from the manufacturers which might affect their evaluation.
What is Embedded Studio?
Embedded Studio is a development environment that is characterized by its flexibility of use and with code optimized for practical use. Embedded Studio contains SEGGER’s own runtime and floating point libraries, compilers and linkers. All these components were developed from the ground up for embedded systems. SEGGER’s primary development goal is to develop fast programs that are easily tailored to the target system and require the least amount of memory.
Optimizations are made at various stages of the build process to reduce code size and improve execution speed. The linker can make optimal use of the typically small memory of microcontrollers. Code blocks can be distributed over several memory areas and unusable memory locations can be omitted.
Embedded Studio supports all the features that characterize J-Link and J-Trace, such as unlimited breakpoints in flash memory or RTT (Real-Time Transfer).
Embedded Studio can be downloaded free of charge for educational and non-commercial purposes on the SEGGER website, no registration necessary: https://www.segger.com/products/development-tools/embedded-studio/
There are no restrictions in terms of code size, features or duration of use.
Test results and “It simply works!”
The test was divided into two areas: Commissioning and running operation. Here, various criteria were evaluated with grades from 1 to 5 (1-1.5= Very good, 5=Doesn’t meet requirements). Details can be found in the original test report. Feel free to download it here: https://www.segger.com/fileadmin/documents/Press_Articles/2021/210223_EN_Press_Elektronik_SEGGER_Embedded_Studio_Web.pdf
Of course, there are a few interesting details worth pointing out:
Several tested commented on how easy everything was upon installation and initial use – even compared to the competition. Just like SEGGER’s motto, “It simply works!” – a spirit all the company’s products share – Embedded Studio ensures ease of use for newcomers and those switching from other products, allowing them to get into a productive workflow as quickly as possible.
Another topic of enormous importance to developers is, of course, the support provided when they have questions during the development process. Once again, several testers pointed out the fast responses and friendly, customer-oriented manner of SEGGER’s staff.
However, “It simply works!” is not only necessary for getting started, but even more so in daily project work – after all, a development environment should increase productivity and not slow it down. The fact that testers pointed out intuitive operation and a “smooth start” to project work shows that Embedded Studio is also a friend of developers here.
In the end, it’s the output that counts: Programming and Debugging
It’s nice when a tool makes getting started easy and simply and provides well-written documentation and support. However, this does little good if core functionality i.e. code development and debugging, isn’t satisfactory.
This is where Embedded Studio really shone: An average score of below 1.4 was even achieved for memory requirements and application analysis, and the memory requirements of a sample code were judged to be “ridiculously low”. And debugging also achieved a top score of 1.35 across all criteria, with the testers once again pointing to the intuitive operation and clarity – again, “It simply works!”
Just try it out – thanks to “friendly licensing” and Project Importer
Thanks to our “Friendly Licensing”, you can try Embedded Studio easily and free of charge – with full functionality and without restriction provided it is for a non-commercial product or evaluation purposes. And if you’re currently working with a competing product and would like to switch to Embedded Studio, we will be happy to provide support with migration – which we know from experience is quite easy in most cases.
Embedded Studio even supports the use of external tool chains, such as the compilers from IAR and Keil. The feature enables developers to build with an external compiler while at the same time taking advantage of the superior Embedded Studio IDE features of project management and advanced debugging. Detailed information you can find here: https://www.segger.com/products/development-tools/embedded-studio/technology/project-importer/
