Expanded VPX DSP offering with two more products based on the Freescale MPC8641D and Xilinx Virtex-5 FPGAs

May 6, 2008 -- VMETRO, a leader in embedded computing solutions based on standards such as VXS, VPX, XMC and FMC that utilize multi-gigabit serial interconnects, today announced two new 6U VPX/REDI hybrid processing engines (HPE), the HPE640 and the HPE720. These products integrate Freescale Power Architecture™ MPC8641D dual-core PowerPC processors for general purpose processing with Xilinx^® Virtex^®-5 FPGAs in a single slot. Both boards, available in air-cooled and conduction-cooled versions, integrate the PowerPC processors with the Virtex-5 FPGAs, front-panel I/O, and VPX backplane connectivity. These two new products, along with products previously announced VPX by VMETRO, provide high-performance digital signal processing capabilities for a wide range of demanding Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance (ISR) applications.

The HPE640 is well suited for applications that stream data from sensors to FPGAs over low overhead, point-to-point protocols like Aurora or Serial FPDP. It can also be integrated with VMETRO’s proven VXS products through the use of a hybrid backplane. The HPE640 integrates two MPC8641D PowerPC processors with a choice of two DSP-optimized Virtex-5 SX95T devices or LX155T devices optimized for high-performance logic and low-power serial connectivity. Each of the two MPC8641D processors has 2GB of DDR2 SDRAM. Each FPGA has six directly connected banks of memory to maximize performance; 36MB (18-bits wide) of QDR2 SRAM memory across four banks and 256MB (16-bits wide) of DDR2 SDRAM memory across two banks. Front panel I/O is provided by an FPGA Mezzanine Card (FMC/VITA 57) site connected to one of the Virtex-5 FPGAs. High-speed PCI Express® links can be utilized for efficient data movement between the two MPC8641D processors as well as between the Virtex-5 FPGAs and the PowerPC processors. In addition, an on-board PCI Express switch supports high-throughput data movement to and from the board via the VPX backplane. An on-board gigabit Ethernet switch provides Gb Ethernet links to each processor as well as four Gb Ethernet links to the backplane.

With an on-board Serial RapidIO (sRIO) switch and four x4 sRIO links to the backplane, the HPE720 supports a distributed switching system architecture that is well suited to Distributed Multi-Processing (DMP) applications. For high performance DMP systems, full mesh architectures can be implemented with HPE720 and the previously announced MPE730 without needing to have a dedicated switch card in the system. The HPE720 integrates a single MPC8641D PowerPC processor with two Xilinx Virtex-5 FPGAs. The FPGA sites can be fitted with the largest Virtex-5 FPGAs available for the most demanding DSP applications, specifically the Virtex-5 LX110T, LX220T, LX330T, SX240T, and FX200T devices. The MPC8641D PowerPC processors supports 2GB of DDR2 SDRAM. The FPGAs have 36MB (36-bits wide) of QDR2 SRAM memory across four banks and 512MB (32-bits wide) of DDR2 SDRAM memory across two banks. The HPE720 provides flexible front panel I/O with support for either two FPGA Mezzanine Card (FMC/VITA 57) sites connected to the FPGAs or one FMC site and one XMC/PMC site. The XMC/PMC site supports PCI-X, PCI Express, and Serial RapidIO options. The on-board RapidIO switch interconnects the MPC8641D processor, the FPGAs, and the XMC site to the VPX backplane.

“Our new hybrid processor boards provide customers with flexibility when designing their VPX-based systems.” comments Thomas Nygaard, Chief Technology Officer of VMETRO. “The power and flexibility that come from combining these products with our other VPX products, like the FPE650 quad-FPGA board and the MPE730 quad-processor board, enable system architects to combine a mix of products to implement their unique system architecture.”

VxWorks and Linux support are provided for the HPE640 and HPE720 boards. To aid developers, a Software and HDL development suite is provided, including FPGA IP blocks such as DMA and memory controllers, a powerful software API for access to FPGA features, and sophisticated examples and utilities for FPGA configuration and development. All library functions are designed to leave a small logic footprint in the FPGAs so that the majority of the resources on all the FPGAs are available for user applications. VMETRO’s new Inter-Processor Communication software for Distributed Multi-Processing (DMP) systems, FusionIPC, is supported on the HPE720, SBC731 and MPE730.