Long life, low power, fanless half size Intel ATOM/Vortex 486 ISA and PCI industrial PC CPU card with PC/104 slot, Industrial chassis, Card cage and backplane with 3, 4, and 6 slots are designed for harsh industrial environment. Acrosser industrial computers have been widely used in machine control, factory automation and power factory monitoring.
Technology event organiser Energi Technical has announced that it will be launching "The Reliable Software Developers' Conference", scheduled for May 2014.
This one-day conference will provide an important forum for engineers and developers working in the development of safety critical systems and high availability systems. It is expected to attract software developers working in such industries as automotive, railway systems, aerospace, banking, medical and energy. www.rsd-conference.co.uk
"In recent years, software has become so complex that ensuring safety and reliability is now a major challenge," said Richard Blackburn, Event Organiser. "Many systems now have millions of lines of code and will handle enormous amounts of data. Further to this, modern computer based systems will make millions of decisions every second and also have to be immune to interference and unpredictable events. This event will look at the MISRA coding standards, debug tools and software testing tools that are available to assist software programmers and engineers seeking to develop reliable and safety critical systems."
The Reliable Software Developers' Conference will be co-located with the 2014 UK Device Developers' Conference. Both will be a one-day conference to be run in Bristol, Cambridge, Northern England and Scotland on May 20th, May 20rd, June 3rd and June 5th.
Delegates attending either event will have the opportunity to sit in on technical presentations and ½ day technical workshops and a attend a vendor exhibition of tools and technology for the development of real-time and embedded systems. www.device-developer-conference.co.uk
"Advanced Debug Tools, Code Test, Version Control, Verification Tools and Software Standards have been a growing feature of recent conferences, so it made sense to create a dedicated event," said Richard. "There will be a lot expertise available to delegates, and the chance to meet a broad range of vendors of test technologies and tools, all under one roof."
Developed in collaboration with MISRA (Coding Standards), the Reliable Software Developers' Conference will feature a number of presentations in the morning, followed by a half-day technical workshop in the afternoon. The presentations will be free and open to delegates of both Conferences, but the half-day workshops will be subject to a charge of £75. Delegates will learn about developments in coding standards, test and verification tools and best practices and it will also be an opportunity to meet with many industry experts.
As we near the end of 2013, Acrosser would like to send you our warmest New Year’s wishes! We wish you and your family health, comfort, and prosperity this holiday season.
We also thank you for keeping up with our latest products, sending us inquiries, and choosing our products for your integrated solution! In 2014, we hope you will continue to choose Acrosser. We look forward to assisting you and your company in becoming the leader in your vertical market, and building a win-win relationship together.
And don’t forget about our star product, AES-HM76Z1FL, and its upcoming Product Testing Event in January! Remember to mark your calendar, since Acrosser is lending the product for free only to selected participants! Please stay tuned for more event information in early January!
With your continuous dedication and our commitment to quality, Acrosser is always motivated to make your embedded idea a reality!
ACROSSER Technology, a world-leading network communication designer and manufacturer, introduces two network appliances that deliver great performance and protection while simplifying your network. Each product has its own target market and appeals to a unique audience.
Acrosser’s ANR-IB75N1/A/B serves as an integrated Unified Threat Management (UTM) device that covers all of your networking security needs. Featuring a 3rd generation Intel Core i processor, increased processing throughput is easily made. For integration with information security systems, the device also features functions such as anti-virus, anti-spam, fire wall, intrusion detection, VPN and web filtering, in order to provide complete solutions to meet the demands of various applications.
Key features of the ANR-IB75N1/A/B include: ‧Support for LGA1155 Intel® Core ™ i7/i5/i3 processor / Pentium CPU ‧Intel B75 Chipset ‧2 x DDRIII DIMM, up to 16GB memory. ‧2 x Intel 82576EB Fiber ports ‧8 x Intel 82574L 10/100/1000Mbps ports ‧Two pairs LAN ports support bypass feature (LAN 1/2 + LAN 3/4) ‧LAN bypass can be controlled by BIOS and Jumper ‧CF socket, 2 x 2.5” HDD, 1 x SATA III, 1 x SATA II ‧Console, VGA (pinhead), 2 x USB 3.0 (2 x external) ‧Support boot from LAN, console redirection ‧Equipped with 80 Plus Bronze PSU to decrease CO2 dissipation and protect our environment ‧LCM module to provide user-friendly interface ‧Standard 1U rackmount size
As for our micro box, the AND-D525N2 provides more possibilities for different applications due to its small form factor (234mm*165mm*44mm). Aside from its space-saving design, the other 3 major features of the AND-D525N2 are its high performance, low power consumption and competitive price. Please send us your inquiry via our website (http://www.acrosser.com/inquiry.html), or simply contact your nearest local sales location for further information.
Key features of the AND-D525N2 include: ‧Intel Atom D525 1.86GHz ‧Intel ICH8M Chipset ‧x DDR3 SO-DIMM up to 4GB ‧1 x 2.5 inch HDD Bay, 1 x CF socket ‧4 x GbE LAN, Realtek 8111E ‧2 x USB2.0 ‧2 x SATA II ‧1 x Console ‧1 x MiniPCIe socket
Besides In addition to these two models, Acrosser also provides a wide selection of network security hardware. With more than 26 years of rich industry experience, Acrosser has the ODM/OEM ability to carry out customized solutions, shortening customers’ time-to-market and creating numerous profits.
December 5, 2013 - The Chinese market for industrial Ethernet & Fieldbus Technologies grew by 18 million nodes in 2012. More than 3 million nodes used Ethernet and the remainder used Fieldbus technology.
Although Fieldbus has a large base of new connected nodes in China, the usage of Fieldbus is not as common as in developed countries such as Germany or the United States. This is mainly because Chinese customers are encountering networking technology much later than those developing countries.
However, the growing speed of Ethernet is quite considerable in China and we think it is a great opportunity for Chinese customers to upgrade their automation system under current market condition. Customers will just jump from old Fieldbus Technologies direct to Ethernet now and actually many of them are doing right now. The Chinese market is currently engaged in extensive upgrading and new infrastructure construction, and that will require a great deal of Ethernet applications.
The demand for computing performance in the IPC market continues to become stronger as the IT field advances. Acrosser’s new AES-HM76Z1FL has been designed to meet these demands.
The F.I.T. Technology used to build this new product reflects its 3 major features: fanless design, Intel core i processor and ultra thin frame. The fanless design not only reduces the risk of exposure to air dust, but also prevents fan-malfunction. With a height of less than 0.8 inches, AES-HM76Z1FL’s slim design makes itself FIT into every application.
As its structure and output interface show, AES-HM76Z1FL provides a wide range of choices, from HDMI, VGA, USB, and audio to GPIO output interfaces that suit almost all industries. For wireless communication needs, the AES-HM76Z1FL has a mini-PCle expansion slot which provides support on both 3.5G and WiFi.
Another fascinating feature of the AES-HM76Z1FL is its ease of installation for expansions. By disassembling the bottom cover, expansions such as CF cards, memory upgrades and mini-PCIe can be easily complete without moving the heat sink. Moreover, Acrosser adopts 4 types of CPU (Intel Core i7/i3, Intel Celeron 1047UE/927UE) for AES-HM76Z1FL, allowing it to satisfy the scalable market demands of different applications.
In conclusion, the AES-HM76Z1FL is truly a well-rounded product designed for diverse applications. To promote our star product AES-HM76Z1FL, Acrosser will launch a product testing campaign starting in January, 2014. Acrosser will provide selected applications with the new AES-HM76Z1FL for one month, and it’s free! For more detailed information, please stay tuned for our press release, or leave us an inquiry on our website at www.acrosser.com!
Over the last few years a number of
automation vendors have announced various services including outsourced
maintenance, system integration, manufacturing and business process consulting,
and remote operations. I wonder if an automation vendor can continue to be
effective as both a product company and services provider.
To clarify the difference, let’s start by defining what I mean by services
and products. By providing services, automation
vendors engage with customers to perform labor and knowledge intensive tasks
that may include system design, engineering services, system integration,
preventative maintenance, remote operations, and other services. By providing
products, automation vendors sell something to the customers, system integrators
and engineering firms that they will apply to accomplish automation tasks in
manufacturing and process environments.
Service Dynamics
The primary objective of a service company should be to focus on the
development a system solution
that is uniquely suited to the idiosyncrasies of the client’s business without
being tethered by particular product solution offerings. A big part of this is
the ability to deploy technologies from appropriate sources using integration
and engineering skills to achieve a superior result for the client. Service
businesses need to have effective and refined project, personnel, and quality
management systems. The growth and effectiveness of these businesses is directly
related to adding and managing smart people and this is a unique business
proficiency mastered by successful service organizations. Pure service
businesses have an advantage of successfully maintaining alliances with a range
of product vendors that cannot be logically achieved by product vendors who
provide services. This separation positions a pure service business to use best
of breed and get the most out of vendors. For comparison, consider you are a
smartphone user and the only place to get apps was your phone hardware
vendor.
Acrosser Technology Co. Ltd, a world-leading industrial and embedded computer designer and manufacturer, announces the new AES-HM76Z1FL embedded system. AES-HM76Z1FL, Acrosser’s latest industrial endeavor, is surely a FIT under multiple circumstances. Innovation can be seen in the new ultra slim fanless design, and its Intel core i CPU can surely cater for those seeking for high performance. Therefore, these 3 stunning elements can be condensed as "F.I.T. Technology." (Fanless, Intel core i, ultra Thin)
The heat sink from the fanless design provides AES-HM76Z1FL with great thermal performance, as well as increases the efficiency of usable space. The fanless design provides dustproof protection, and saving the product itself from fan malfunction. AES-HM76Z1FL has thin client dimensions, with a height of only 20 millimeters (272 mm x183 mm x 20 mm). This differs from most embedded appliances, which have a height of more than 50 millimeters.
The AES-HM76Z1FL embedded system uses the latest technology in scalable Intel Celeron and 3rd generation Core i7/i3 processors with a HM76 chipset. It features graphics via VGA and HDMI, DDR3 SO-DIMM support, complete I/O such as 4 x COM ports, 3 x USB3.0 ports, 8 x GPI and 8 x GPO, and storage via SATA III and Compact Flash. The AES-HM76Z1FL also supports communication by 2 x RJ-45 gigabit Ethernet ports, 1 x SIM slot, and 1 x MinPCIe expansion socket for a 3.5G or WiFi module.
Different from most industrial products that focus on application in one specific industry, the AES-HM76Z1FL provides solutions for various applications through the complete I/O interfaces. Applications of the AES-HM76Z1FL include: embedded system solutions, control systems, digital signage, POS, Kiosk, ATM, banking, home automation, and so on. It can support industrial automation and commercial bases under multiple circumstances.
Key features: ‧Fanless and ultra slim design ‧Support Intel Ivy Bridge CPU with HM76 chipset ‧2 x DDR3 SO-DIMM, up to 16GB ‧Support SATA III and CF storage ‧HDMI/VGA/USB/Audio/GPIO output interface ‧Serial ports by RS-232 and RS-422/485 ‧2 x GbE, 1 x SIM, and 1 x MiniPCIe(for3G/WiFi)
The impact of the new standards to UAV developers using model-based design is
especially significant. Before describing this, an introduction to model-based
design is appropriate. Introduction to model-based design
With model-based design, UAV engineers develop and simulate system models
comprised of hardware and software using block diagrams and state charts, as
shown in Figures 1 and 2. They then automatically generate, deploy, and verify
code on their Embedded
Systems. With textual computation languages and block diagram model
tools, one can generate code in C, C++, Verilog, and VHDL languages, enabling
implementation on MCU, DSP[], FPGA[], and ASIC hardware. This lets system,
software, and hardware engineers collaborate using the same tools and
environment to develop, implement, and verify systems. Given their auto-nomous
nature, UAV systems heavily employ closed-loop controls, making system modeling
and closed-loop simulation, as shown in Figures 1 and 2, a natural
fit. Testing actual UAV systems via ground-controlled flight tests is
expensive. A better way is to test early in the design process using desktop
simulation and lab test benches. With model-based design, verification starts as
soon as models are created and simulated for the first time. Tests cases based
on high-level requirements formalize simulation testing. A common verification
workflow is to reuse the simulation tests throughout model-based design as the
model transitions from system model to software model to source code to
executable object code using code generators and cross-compilers.
An in-the-loop testing strategy is often used as itemized below and
summarized in Table 2:
1. Simulation test cases are derived and run on the model using
Model-In-the-Loop (MIL) testing.
2. Source code is verified by compiling and executing it on a host computer
using Software-In-the-Loop (SIL) testing.
3. Executable object code is verified by cross-compiling and executing it on
the embedded
processor or an instruction set simulator using Processor-In-the-Loop (PIL)
testing.
4. Hardware implementation is verified by synthesizing HDL and executing it
on an FPGA using FPGA-In-the-Loop (FIL) testing.
5. The embedded
system is verified and validated using the original plant model using
Hardware-In-the-Loop (HIL) testing. A requirements-based test approach with
test reuse for models and code is explicitly described in ARP4754A, DO-178C, and
DO-331, the model-based design supplement to DO-178C.
refer to:
http://mil-embedded.com/articles/transitioning-do-178c-arp4754a-uav-using-model-based-design/
A recent report by IHS has shown that in 2012, capital expenditure on industrial
automation equipment in Asia reached a total of $76.6bn, representing 46% of
global investments in the sector.
Despite this established and rising trend, selling automation
computers equipment in Asia remains a clear business opportunity and one
where many European providers are lagging behind.
In order to help businesses better understand how to take advantage of the
current climate and increase their industrial
automation sales in Asia, particularly China, the CC-Link Partner
Association (CLPA) is hosting a seminar entitled ‘Gateway to China’. The event
will take place on 24th September at the Mitsubishi Electric Europe Tokyo
Conference Suite in Hatfield.
In light of the sensitive current economic climate, many Asian companies are
taking a more careful approach to investment – they are becoming more demanding
towards their suppliers and making more enquiries before purchasing.
Furthermore, according to IHS’ research, several Chinese manufacturers are
currently developing products which are in direct competition with the ones
provided by Western suppliers of industrial
automation. These are only a few of the obstacles facing European vendors
who want to penetrate the Asian market to change the way they do business.
Flexibility and the ability to respond to very specific demands are becoming
essential factors when dealing with the Asian market. Being able to offer
technologies and solutions which
are compatible with the needs of Asian clients is no longer an option, it’s a
must.
Register Protection
There may be modules in the design whose configuration should not change during the run phase of the chip, and in doing so may affect the proper operation of the system. One can disable access to these registers during run phase, or make such registers as write-once.
Redundant critical on-chip modules like processor, ISO, DMA controller, internal clock generator, and communications peripherals can improve reliability should a primary hardware module become non-functional while the vehicle is running. Such a system can have in-built error detection mechanisms and on-the-fly switching to redundant hardware to mitigate threats to passenger safety.
But this kind of redundant hardware architecture comes with the penalty of increased area and higher power management in silicon. Area penalties can be minimized by intelligent selection of which functions need to be duplicated in silicon. Power can be minimized by adopting power and clock gating in the redundant modules. Some in-vehicle computers can be implemented in lock-step of each other, where primary and redundant modules process the same input. Mismatch in the output of the lock-step modules indicates a defect in either of the modules. The system can switch itself off or take appropriate safety measures to avoid any real-time failure. Redundant hardware should be placed quite far in silicon from the primary embedded systems to avoid tampering of both modules together.
refer to: http://www.edn.com/design/automotive/4421704/Safety---security-architecture-for-automotive-ICs
It is the author’s opinion that integration of the controls networking and the IT network is inevitable. It became
inevitable the moment the controls industry chose to use Ethernet as the medium
with which to communicate data. The controls industry may choose to be dragged
kicking and screaming into the modern automation era, or it can gracefully embrace the change.
Embracing means the controls industry would be able to leverage the myriad rich,
existing technologies that have been proven foolproof in the IT world. To be
dragged kicking and screaming into the modern communications era would do a
terrible injustice to those who have worked diligently to bring it about. This
could quite possibly add an entirely new facet to the fieldbus wars, which I
hope have not been forgotten.
With that said, the controls world is going to be moving with an industry
that has a definite consumer bias, with product development and release cycles
of six months or less. In an industry where the average life expectancy of an
automotive production line is eight years, it is impossible to expect the networking in an industrial setting to keep up with modern IT
standards. Therefore, we turn our attention to the technologies that have
existed the longest, with the most open standards and the very best support.
These are the protocols we wish to use and keep, and this article highlights and
explains some of these technologies.
refer to:
http://www.automation.com/leveraging-it-technology-for-industrial-controls-applications
Memory protection to prevent applications from interfering with one another solutions accelerators that ensure deterministic, low-latency responses for real-time guests.
The ability to assign I/O to guest OSs for unimpeded, high-performance access Several Alliance members provide RTOS and hypervisor products that support the 4th generation Intel Core processors. For example, fanless embedded systems TenAsys eVM for Windows is a real-time hypervisor that uses Intel VT to enable RTOSs and other guest OSs to run along with Microsoft Windows. TenAsys also offers the INtime RTOS family, which can run as a stand-alone RTOS or alongside Microsoft Windows as shown in Figure 3. Both products enable users to partition a multicore platform to run mixed fanless embedded systems, making better use of the processor’s advanced features to provide highly integrated solutions. (Microsoft and TenAsys are both Associate members of the Alliance.)
While many pneumatic actuators have remained unchanged, except for the addition of smart positioners, there have been some new innovations in pneumatic actuation.
A number of piston and rotary actuators have been creeping into power plants, which primarily have used diaphragm actuators on control valves. Pneumatic actuators equipped with smart positioners now functionally compete with electric actuators in terms of fail-in-position operation on loss of signal at significantly less cost ofembedded systems.
They work in harsh environments, and they get little or no recognition. But their impact on power plant efficiency can be significant. Valves and actuators are critical in almost every aspect of single board computer.
With JR and AWL’s standing as leading global system integrators, this strategic embedded system partnership will facilitate an environment rich with knowledge, ability, and possibility for our customers. Yet, along with the advancement of customer success at the helm, the innovative strategies of JR automation and AWL-Techniek have aligned, creating a partnership that will allow global customer bases to benefit from an equally global system integrator presence. JR will service and support customers in the US, Canada, and Mexico, and AWL will support customers in Europe and China.
Similarly, AWL is a leader in production industrial computer and experienced in the automotive and general industries with proficiency in laser welding. So let's just wait and see how it goes in this every changing market.
German based Lauterbach is recognised for both engineering excellence and exceptional technical support. The quality and capability of Lauterbach tools enable engineers to develop robust code whilst minimising development time lost to debugging. They have become a favourite with many hi-tech engineers, supporting more than 3500 embedded computers and all known ARM Cores; covering products from over 75 embedded computers companies.
Engineers working in the development of software for automotive embedded computers will have the opportunity to learn about the latest tools and techniques at Lauterbach's September Automotive Forum.
Much of the content will be based around the embedded computers development and validation of Autosar compliant code and the development of code for specific devices such as the BOSCH GTM, the AURIX and Freescale's Nexus based Qorivva solutions. Some of the presentations will also touch on the debugging of code on multicore systems. Delegates will also have the opportunity to discuss their specific challenges and requirements.
This is just one example of why embedded computer telehealth strategies are poised to revolutionize medicine. Telehealth not only provides quick access to specialists, but can also remotely monitor patients and reduce clinical expenses. Many of the systems needed to realize these benefits will operate on the edge, and require technology with the portability and price point of commercial mobile platforms, as well as the flexibility to perform multiple functions securely and in real time. All of this must be provided in a embedded computer package that can meet the rigors of certification and scale over long lifecycle deployments.
The ability to transition between x86 and ARM processors is critical for low-volume medical applications because a single carrier board – often the most costly component of a COM architecture – embedded computer can suit the needs of both graphics-intensive systems and platforms that require more mobility and lower power. In addition to reducing Time-To-Market (TTM), this decreases Bill Of Materials (BOM) costs and eases Board Support Package (BSP) implementation, says Christoph Budelmann, General Manager, Budelmann Elektronik GmbH in Münster, Germany (www.budelmann-elektronik.com).
The use of FPGAs for the I/O embedded system implementation may be more difficult than using a dedicated controller. On the other hand, an implementation in a programmable device has multiple advantages. FPGAs are intended for embedded applications, with a long support lifecycle, a wide temperature range, and the option to move the IP to a more recent device when needed. In addition, using a soft IP, the interface can be improved and new embedded system features can be added. A simple end-point interface can be upgraded to a test resource by adding more extensive error detection and injection capabilities.
CES has long used FPGAs for I/O customization and to implement test devices. The new CES FIOV-2310 product is a 3U VPX board with a Kintex-7 FPGA and an FMC slot (Figure 2). A wide range of FMC mezzanines are available from partners and from independent vendors, both for signal processing and I/O customization applications.
Using Ethernet as an integrated embedded computer processor interconnect requires significant transaction acceleration and solutions to the Ethernet Media Access Controller (MAC) as well as the Ethernet switch devices themselves. Even with these enhancements, RDMA operations should be limited to large block transactions to amortize the overhead of using Ethernet.
Standards that have been deployed to solve this problem include the iWARP RDMA protocol from the Internet Engineering Task Force and RDMA over Converged Ethernet (RoCE). Both iWARP and RoCE are typically implemented through acceleration coprocessors. Despite this acceleration, RDMA transactions must still be carefully managed to reduce communications overhead. The reason is that although Ethernet offers high bandwidth, especially in 10 GbE and 40 GbE implementations, it also has high transaction embedded computer tencies that are typically measured in microseconds.
After
a embedded computer's life-cycle analysis and the “sticker shock” associated with the cost of a
commercial OS, designers usually also consider “free” open source operating
systems. Although open source software eliminates some initial cost problems,
there are still significant issues that must be addressed. One problem voiced
by potential open source users is the lack of a central embedded computer resource to provide support
similar to a commercial software vendor. Developers can often find answers to
their questions through the Internet, but no one is on the hook to research and
respond to a specific question. Open source products are generalized in order
to fit the widest array of users and can force designers to modify the hardware
configuration, resulting in higher recurring cost for the embedded device. refer to: http://embedded-computing.com/articles/choose-right-embedded-operating-system/
Each client is then part of the cloud’s shared infrastructure. Anything between the Internet and the servers is a shared embedded computer infrastructure. If something happens to the shared infrastructure, all customers hosted in the cloud will be affected. If a firewall goes down, nobody can access the cloud. About 63 percent of embedded computer attacks strike the shared infrastructure as it’s the first thing the attack will hit.“Prior to recent attacks on embedded computer financial institutions in the U.S., there was not much awareness or knowledge of embedded computer attacks and other cyber threats,” Kenig says.
Traceability also provides essential project information that often can’t be obtained in any other way. It provides testers with an easily understandable and reportable measure of product quality. By knowing which requirements remain unsatisfied, and whether they have issues logged against them, testers can estimate the time remaining to product completion. Last, traceability enables teams to better understand the work remaining, and in which functional areas of the product that work remains.
Managing requirements, test cases, and defects using Microsoft Word or Excel is challenging enough. But tracing requirements through test cases to defects and back to requirements is impossible without a real tracking system.
Virtualization trends in commercial computing offer benefits for cost, reliability, and security, but pose a challenge for military operators who need to visualize lossless imagery in real time. 10 GbE technology enables a standard zero client solution for viewing pixel-perfect C4ISR sensor and graphics information with near zero interactive latency.
For C4ISR systems, ready access to and sharing of visual information at any operator position can increase situational awareness and mission effectiveness. Operators utilize multiple information sources including computers and camera feeds, as well as high-fidelity radar and sonar imagery. Deterministic real-time interaction with remote computers and sensors is required to shorten decision loops and enable rapid actions. A zero client represents the smallest hardware footprint available for manned positions in a distributed computing environment. Zero clients provide user access to remote computers through a networked remote desktop connection or virtual desktop infrastructure. Utilizing a 10 GbE media network for interconnecting multiple computers, sensors, and clients provides the real-time performance and image quality required for critical visualization operations.
A new All-in-OneGaming Board, the AMB-A55EG1. AMB-A55EG1 features AMD Embedded G-Series T56N 1.65GHz dual-core APU, two DDR3-1333 SO-DIMM, which provides great computing and graphic performance is suitable for casino gaming and amusement applications. It is designed to comply with the most gaming regulations including GLI, BMM, and Comma 6A. AMB-A55EG1 is specifically designed to be a cost competitive solution for the entry-level gaming market.
In conclusion, AMB-A55EG1 bridges Acrosser’s innovated gaming solutions and AMD Embedded G-Series APU to bring the optimum combination of computing power, graphic performance, and gaming features. Acrosser supports all gaming products in Windows XP Pro, XP embedded and mainstream Linux operation system with complete software development kit (SDK). In addition, Acrosser’s gaming platforms have a minimum 5-year availability to fulfill the demand of long term supply in gaming industry.
Though it has been discussed for many years, optical embedded computer interconnects are finally showing up in board-level product announcements. Several embedded computer of the VITA 66 VPX fiber optic interconnect specification are complete and suppliers have real products. More work is needed to address the optical backplane, but this is the first wave of what is expected to grow quickly in the near future."The most important design concern for connectors in critical embedded computing is always electrical performance – this could be signal integrity in a high-data-rate connector or conductivity in a power connector," gaming platform commented Greg Powers, market development manager at TE Connectivity. "The immediate secondary gaming platform is mechanical performance in the environment, including shock, vibration, temperature, durability, etc. Connectors are truly electro-mechanical systems".
Looking even further into the future, connector suppliers are studying ways to integrate the board connection into the cable to additional reduce the impact that the physical connector has on signals as they pass from the PWB to the connector and on to the transport medium, whether it be copper or optical.
Reliability for Industrial Grade products comes from the controller/firmware, NAND memory and other components used. High grade controllers/firmware developed specifically for the Industrial marketplace and thoroughly tested gaming prior to launch have several advantages. They are optimal in environments susceptible to power loss and they increase endurance cycles through Industrial Grade ECC (Error Checking and Correction), defect management and wear leveling. The use of SLC NAND from world class vendors and only using the highest grade and specification of discrete components are the other two gaming pieces in the reliability puzzle. refer to: http://embedded-computing.com/news/benefits-industrial-flash-storage-devices/
Consumers today desire an on-demand computing experience that entails having data available at the ready anytime. Gone are the days when consumers owned smartphones for the sole purpose of making phone calls. They now require a rich user experience allowing them to access documents, e-mail, pictures, video, and more on their mobile devices. Combined with the more than 37 billion applications already downloaded, data consumption continues to rise. According to a recent Cisco report, global mobile data traffic from 2011 and 2016 will grow to 10.8 exabytes (1 billion gigabytes) per month, and by 2016, video is expected to comprise 71 percent of all mobile data traffic.
As with any technology shift, designers must consider several factors to address the changing landscape, but in this case, a few issues stand out more than the rest as trends that will define where mobility is going.
In response to growing pressure to boost the performance and trim down the size of embedded applications, standards organizations meet regularly to optimize their portfolios in light of the latest available technology.
IDC is predicting that 15 billion intelligent devices will be connected to the Internet by 2015. This explosion in connected embedded devices has spawned a new generation of hackers targeting mobile devices, automobiles, medical equipment, and other systems. ...
Given the increased complexity of processors and applications, the current generation of Operating Systems (OSs) focuses mostly on software integrity while partially neglecting the need to extract maximum performance out of the existing hardware.
Processors perform as well as OSs allow them to. A computing platform, embedded or otherwise, consists of not only physical resources – memory, CPU cores, peripherals, and buses – managed with some success by resource partitioning (virtualization), but also performance resources such as CPU cycles, clock speed, memory and I/O bandwidth, and main/cache memory space. These resources are managed by ancient methods like priority or time slices or not managed at all. As a result, processors are underutilized and consume too much energy, robbing them of their true performance potential.
Most existing management schemes are fragmented. CPU cycles are managed by priorities and temporal isolation, meaning applications that need to finish in a preset amount of time are reserved that time, whether they actually need it or not. Because execution time is not safely predictable due to cache misses, miss speculation, and I/O blocking, the reserved time is typically longer than it needs to be. To ensure that the modem stack in a smartphone receives enough CPU cycles to carry on a call, other applications might be restricted to not run concurrently. This explains why some users of an unnamed brand handset complain that when the phone rings, GPS drops.
Separate from this, power management has recently received a great deal of interest. Notice the “separate” characterization. Most deployed solutions are good at detecting idle times, use modes with slow system response, or particular applications where the CPU can run at lower clock speeds and thus save energy. For example, Intel came up with Hurry Up and Get Idle (HUGI). To understand HUGI, consider this analogy: Someone can use an Indy car at full speed to reach a destination and then park it, but perhaps using a Prius to get there just in time would be more practical. Which do you think uses less gas? Power management based on use modes has too coarse a granularity to effectively mine all energy reduction opportunities all the time.
Ideally, developers want to vary the clock speed/voltage to match the instantaneous workload, but that cannot be done by merely focusing on the running application. Developers might be able to determine minimum clock speed for an application to finish on time, but can they slow down the clock not knowing how other applications waiting to run will be affected if they are delayed? Managing tasks and clock speed (power) separately cannot lead to optimum energy consumption. The winning method will simultaneously manage/optimize all performance resources, but at a minimum, manage the clock speed and task scheduling. Imagine the task scheduler being the trip planner and the clock manager as the car driver. If the car slows down, the trip has to be re-planned. The driver might have to slow down because of bad road conditions (cache misses) or stop at a railroad barrier (barrier in multithreading, blocked on buffer empty due to insufficiently allocated I/O bandwidth, and so on). Applications that exhibit data-dependent execution time also present a problem, as the timing of when they finish isn’t known until they finish. What clock speed should be allocated for these applications in advance?
An advanced performance management solution
One example of managing performance resources is VirtualMetrix Performance Management (PerfMan), which controls all performance resources by a parametrically driven algorithm. Thesoftware schedules tasks, changes clock speed, determines idle periods, and allocates I/O bandwidth and cache space based on performance data such as bandwidth consumed and instructions retired. This approach (diagrammed in Figure 1) solves the fragmentation problem and can lead to optimum resource allocation, even accounting for the unpredictability of the execution speed of modern processors and data-dependent applications.
Figure 1: PerfMan controls all performance resources using a parametrically driven algorithm, leading to optimum resource allocation.
The patent-pending work performed allocation algorithm uses a closed-loop method that makes allocation decisions by comparing work completed with work still to be performed, expressed in any of the measurable performance quantities the system offers. For example, if the application is a video player or communication protocol that fills a buffer, PerfMan can keep track of the buffer fill level and determine the clock speed and time to run so that the buffer is filled just in time. The time to finish will inevitably vary, so the decision is cyclically updated. In many cases, buffers are overfilled to prevent blocking on buffer empty, which can lead to timing violations. PerfMan is capable of precise performance allocation, keeping buffering to a minimum and reducing memory footprint. The algorithm can handle hard, soft, and non-real-time applications mixed together.
If the application execution graph is quantified into simple performance parameters and the deadlines are known when they matter, the algorithm will dynamically schedule to meet deadlines just in time. Even non-real-time applications need some performance allocation to avoid indefinite postponement. Allocating the minimum processor resources an application needs increases system utilization, resulting in a higher possible workload. The method does not rely on strict priorities, although they can be used. The priority or order in execution is the direct result of the urgency the application exhibits while waiting its turn to run, which is a function of the basic work to be performed/worked completed paradigm.
Extending to more dimensions
If tasks are ready to run in existing OSs, they will run, but do they need to? Can they be delayed (forced idling) if the OS knows it will not affect their operation?
Knowing the timing of every task and whether it is running or waiting to run with respect to its progress toward completion allows the software to automatically determine the minimum clock speed and runtime. Thus everything completes on time under all load conditions. Matching clock speed to the instantaneous workload does not mean the clock speed is always minimized. The goal of low energy consumption sometimes calls for a burst of high speed followed by idle, as in Intel’s HUGI. But even then, there is no benefit in running faster than the optimum utilization (executed operations per unit of time) would indicate. Fast clocking while waiting for memory operations to complete does not save energy.
The algorithm’s mantra of “highest utilization/workload at the lowest energy consumption” is largely accomplished with a closed-loop algorithm managing all performance resources.
In multicore systems, a balanced load, low multithreading barrier latency, and the lowest overall energy consumption cannot be achieved simultaneously. To resolve this, PerfMan can be configured to optimize one or several performance attributes. If minimum energy consumption is the goal, an unbalanced system with some cores that are highly loaded and others that are empty and thus shut down might offer the lowest energy consumption at the expense of longer execution latency and overall lower performance.
Accelerating threads to reduce barrier latency can also lead to higher energy consumption. However, meeting deadlines (hard or soft) overrides all other considerations. The precise closed-loop-based performance resource allocation algorithm can safely maintain a higher workload level, which in turn, allows pushing the core consolidation further than possible with existing methods and thus achieving higher energy reduction.
Implementation on VMX Linux
PerfMan has been implemented as a thin kernel (sdKernel) running independently of the resident OS. It has been ported to Linux 2.6.29 (VMX Linux), as shown in Figure 2. An Android port is nearing completion. The software takes over Linux task scheduling and interworks with the existing power management infrastructure. A separate version of the sdKernel provides virtualization and supports hard real-time tasks in a POSIX-compliant environment. Scheduling/context switching is at the submicrosecond level on many platforms, but because most Linux system calls are too slow for hard real-time applications, the sdKernel provides APIs for basic peripherals, timers, and other resources.
Figure 2: In a Linux implementation, PerfMan takes over Linux task scheduling and interworks with the existing power management infrastructure.
By monitoring performance, the software can detect unusual execution patterns that predict an upcoming OS panic and crash. In such cases, the sdKernel will notify mission-critical applications to stop using Linux system calls and temporarily switch over to sdKernel APIs (safe mode) while Linux is being rebooted.
VMX Linux supports a mix of real and non-real-time applications with efficient performance isolation while minimizing energy consumption. It can also provide hardware isolation/securityand safe crash landing.
Benchmarks show the results
The energy consumption, measured in real time using a VMX-designed energy meter, was accumulated for the system and correlated to individual applications. A media player application (video and audio) was run on an OMAP35xx BeagleBoard first using standard Linux 2.6.29 (Figure 3 red graph) and then VMX Linux (Figure 3 blue graph).
Figure 3: Using VMX Linux on an OMAP35xx BeagleBoard achieves a 95 percent average load that finishes just in time.
Performance compliance (Perf Compl graph) shows how close the application tasks come to finish on time (center line). Below the line indicates deadline violations. Notice that with VMX Linux, a 95 percent average load is achieved with no prebuffering and no deadline violations, but it gets close. The total board energy consumption for the 46 seconds of video dropped from 68.7 W*sec to 27.6 W*sec with VMX Linux. The displayed data represents averages over a preset interval. As an additional bonus, when Linux is purposely crashed, the video disappears but the music plays on in safe mode with no audible glitches.
In short, the implementation creates a new approach to performance management with exciting results.
refer: http://embedded-computing.com/articles/performance-management-new-dimension-operating-systems/
Machine-to-Machine (M2M) communications strategies and cloud computing are transforming industrial interconnects from an assortment of fragmented, proprietary technologies to open standards easily integrated into new designs. This new direction in M2M connectivity enables a wide range of applications and services by exchanging real-time data between remote devices, one or more central servers, and authorized third parties.
M2M technology allows embedded design teams to contain costs, improve security, enable remote management, and maximize system availability. The major goal of M2M communications is to combine real-time data from remote devices with enterprise applications to automate everyday company decisions and thus optimize industrial output and lower operating costs.
In this issue of Industrial Embedded Systems, we asked contributors to take a look at the networking, sensing, and computing issues affecting embedded design for industrial applications. For example, Mike Ueland, senior VP and general manager at Telit Wireless Solutions North America, describes the benefits and cost savings associated with M2M connections for remotely monitoring and managing assets. Mike outlines several good reasons to support an M2M industrial application based on cellular technology. In an in-depth interview covering intelligent networking technologies, Tom Barber, director of marketing at Silicon Labs, presents a new wireless microcontrollerproduct that fulfills the requirements of embedded applications with RF connectivity. Tom also highlights the new capabilities offered in low-power mesh networks resulting from Silicon Labs’ acquisition of Ember Corporation. Expanding the discussion, Shaye Shayegani, senior field applications engineer at Lantronix, answers questions on the security and adaptability of industrial networking modules. Shaye addresses the major connectivity challenges that industrial customers are dealing with right now.
Changing the subject to the sensitivity and stability of brushless DC motors in industrial applications, Honeywell Sensing and Control’s Joshua Edberg, senior global marketing manager in the Magnetic Sensors division, and Fred Hintz, engineering manager in the Speed and Position Sensors division, dispel three myths of chopper stabilization techniques. Covering another topic essential to factory settings, Karim Wassef, director of DC-DC product line management at GE Energy’s Power Electronics division, answers questions about the power sources available to operate in hostile conditions such as extended temperatures or corrosive environments. In a software-related topic, Doug Jones and Brian McKay, marketing managers at MathWorks, cover the advantages Model-Based Design offers for complex industrial control systems, allowing users to simulate, test, and debug circuitry before committing it to hardware.
This issue also includes our annual Resource Guide, with a comprehensive directory of embedded products divided into dozens of categories to simplify your next industrial design project. You can find a wide selection of off-the shelf industrial systems, small form factor modules, power sources, panel computers, enclosures, and specialized embedded components to solve your unique requirements. You will also find embedded support software including operating systems plusdata acquisition and motion control systems. Our aim is to provide a reference source of available products that match your future design projects. If you have suggestions or products for the next Resource Guide, please let us know.
The articles and interviews in this issue include a wide-ranging look at the embedded industry from the industrial perspective and should serve as a valuable technical resource for your next design project. Please give us your ideas on technical articles and online updates that we can provide to support your design efforts.
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