PC/104 Embedded Solutions - Spring 2006 - PC/104 and Small ...

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Spring 2006 

Volume 10 Number 1 

w w w . p c 1 0 4 o n l i n e . c o m 

COLUMNS 

8 PC/104 Embedded Consortium 

The PC/104 Embedded Consortium – Strength in numbers 

By Tom Barnum, PC/104 Embedded Consortium 

10 PC/104 Fundamentals 101 

Internal system cabling 101 

By Joel Huebner 

12 European Perspective 

A closer look at small form factors 

By Stefan Baginski 

50 Editor’s Insight 

PC/104 and others: The fork in the road between desktops 

and embedded 

By Chris A. Ciufo 

DEPARTMENTS 

38 Product Guide 

Industrial, rugged and MIL-SPEC products 

44 Editor’s Choice Products 


47 New Products 

By Sharon Schnakenburg 

48 Advertiser Index 

On the cover: 

Industrial robots like this welder 

work in some of the harshest 

environments on the planet: 

automated factories. PC/104 and 

other small form factor products 

are ideal candidates to control 

these machines and survive in 

hostile locations. 

Cover inset product: 

VersaLogic’s AMD Élan SC520-based “Lynx” 

SBC adheres to the PC/104-Plus standard and 

also meets EU RoHS directive 2002/95/EC. 

Published by: 

/ Spring 2006 

OpenSystems 

Publishing 

© 2006 OpenSystems Publishing © 2006 PC/104 Embedded Solutions 

All registered brands and trademarks in PC/104 Embedded Solutions are property of their respective owners. 

PC/104 Embedded Solutions 

FEATURES 

HARDWARE: Cluster computing 

16 Case study: FPGA-PCI104 enables cluster computing 

distributed switch 

By Graham Campbell, PhD, and Daniel T. O’Leary, Ether2 Corp. 

SOFTWARE: Motor control 

20 Cut product development time and costs with PC/104 and 

microcontroller platforms 

By Walter Calmette and Glenn de Caussin, Calmotion, LLC 

TECHNOLOGY: EPIC Express 

28 Bringing PCI Express to embedded applications 

By Phillip Menicos, Octagon Systems 

SPECIAL: Rugged, rural computing 

32 Going where no PC has gone before 

By Chris Bennetts, VIA Technologies, Inc. 

EVENTS 

Embedded Systems Conference Silicon Valley 

April 3-7, 2006 

San Jose McEnery Convention Center 

www.embedded.com/esc/sv 

RTS Embedded Systems Paris 

April 4-6, 2006 

Paris, France 

www.birp.com/rts2006 

E-LETTER 

Spring: www.pc104online.com/eletter 

Mini-ITX offers a useful alternative to traditional embedded boards 

By Michele Lukowski, Roland Groeneveld, Logic Supply, Inc. 

Interpolating DACs offer high speeds, but are they controllable? 

By Robert J. Leach, Howard University 

WEB RESOURCES 

Subscribe to the magazine or E-letter at: 

www.opensystems-publishing.com/subscriptions 

Industry news: 

Read: www.pc104online.com/news 

Submit: www.opensystems-publishing.com/news/submit 

Submit new products at: 

www.opensystems-publishing.com/vendors/submissions/np

A n O p e n S y s t e m s P u b l i c a t i o n 

Military & Aerospace Group 

n DSP-FPGA Product Resource Guide 

n DSP-FPGA.com 

n DSP-FPGA.com E-letter 

n Military Embedded Systems 

n Military Embedded Systems E-letter 

n PC/104 Embedded Solutions 

n PC/104 Embedded Solutions E-letter 

n PC/104 & Small Form Factor Catalog 

n VMEbus Systems 

n VMEbus Systems E-letter 

Group Editorial Director 

Assistant Editor 

Senior Editor (columns) 

European Bureau Chief 

Managing Editor 

Art Director 

Senior Web Developer 

Graphic Specialist 

Circulation/Office Manager 

Chris Ciufo 

cciufo@opensystems-publishing.com 

Sharon Schnakenburg 

sschnakenburg@opensystems-publishing.com 

Terri Thorson 

tthorson@opensystems-publishing.com 

Stefan Baginski 

sbaginski@opensystems-publishing.com 

Bonnie Crutcher 

Steph Sweet 

Konrad Witte 

OpenSystems Publishing 

OpenSystems 

Publishing 

David Diomede 

Editorial/Production office: 

16872 E. Ave. of the Fountains, Ste 203 

Fountain Hills, AZ 85268 

Tel: 480-967-5581 n Fax: 480-837-6466 

Website: www.opensystems-publishing.com 

Spring 2005 


Phyllis Thompson 

subscriptions@opensystems-publishing.com 

Publishers 

Vice President Editorial 

John Black, Michael Hopper, Wayne Kristoff 

Rosemary Kristoff 

Communications Group 

Editorial Director Joe Pavlat 

Associate Editor (articles) Anne Fisher 

Senior Editor (columns) Terri Thorson 

Technology Editor Curt Schwaderer 

European Representative Hermann Strass 

Embedded and Test & Analysis Group 

Editorial Director Jerry Gipper 

Editorial Director Don Dingee 

Senior Editor (articles) Terri Thorson 

Technical Editor Chad Lumsden 

Associate Editor Jennifer Hesse 

Special Projects Editor Bob Stasonis 

European Representative Hermann Strass 

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PC/104 Embedded Solutions ISSN Print 1096-9764, ISSN Online 1550-0373 

Publication Agreement Number: 40048627 

Canada return address: WDS, Station A, PO Box 54, Windsor, ON N9A 615 

PC104 Embedded Solutions is published five times a year by OpenSystems 

Publishing LLC., 30233 Jefferson Ave., St. Clair Shores, MI 48082. Subscriptions 

are free, upon request in writing, to persons dealing with or considering PC104 

Embedded Solutions. For others inside the US and Canada, subscriptions are 

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PC/104 Embedded Solutions


The PC/104 Embedded Consortium – 

Strength in numbers 

By Tom Barnum 

Annual strategic planning 

meeting recap 

The PC/104 Embedded Consortium held 

its annual two-day strategic planning session 

in January 2006. Executives from 

leading PC/104 and related small form 

factor manufacturing companies who are 

active as executive members and/or act 

as directors for the PC/104 Consortium 

attended the annual meeting. 

The purpose of the annual session is to 

examine technical and business issues 

related to the PC/104 industry. In addition, 

the meeting focuses on establishing 

short- and long-term goals and allocating 

the requisite resources to achieve them. 

Topics of discussion at this year’s event 

included an update to our mission statement, 

which now includes other small 

form factor boards. And nevertheless, 

the consortium will continue to emphasize 

the “stackable” nature of PC/104 and 

limit new offerings to those that include 

PC/104 expansion. 

The updated mission statement, in draft 

form, is: “Promote the use of PC/104 and 

other small form factor CPUs with PC/104 

stackable I/O expansion capability.” 

The intention behind the recast mission 

statement is to continue to preserve our 

PC/104 (ISA) heritage while providing 

a bridge to emergent technologies 

in the future. I’ll echo Chris Ciufo’s 

recent comment as he announced the 

change of OpenSystems Publishing’s 

PC/104 Embedded Solutions magazine 

to PC/104 and Small Form Factors: 

“PC/104 remains our core mission and 

technology.” (PC/104 Embedded Solutions, 

Winter 2005.) 

Beyond the recast mission, directors 

participated in technical discussions, laid 

the groundwork for this year’s marketing 

program, and aligned resources and activities 

to support our goals. There was lively 

discussion on a “next-generation” PC/104 

platform supporting PCI-Express and spirited 

debate over the consortium’s possible 

adoption of the EPIC Express platform. 

There were decisions made with respect 

to the consortium’s first-ever attendance 

at a European tradeshow – Embedded 

World in Nuremberg, Germany. 

Positive market outlook 

More interesting than the topics covered 

was the general sense from participants 

that, overall, things are pretty darn good 

for the players in the PC/104 industry. 

All of the members who were present at 

the strategic planning session are leaders 

of, apparently, very successful organizations. 

The market for embedded product 

continues to grow, and PC/104 continues 

to enjoy a compound annual growth rate 

higher than that of the overall embedded 

computer market. There is a well-established 

ecosystem of vendors and product 

offerings available with more than a 

hundred unique manufacturers selling 

upwards of a thousand different PC/104 

platforms, including nearly unlimited I/O 

options. Multiple vendors are a reflection 

of a healthy standard, as there is a critical 

mass of PC/104 products compared to 

other proprietary form factor products on 

the market. 

PC/104 and its derivatives continue to be 

an excellent choice for designers seeking 

a rugged, stackable, small-size embedded 

computing platform. There are numerous 

independent websites promulgating 

PC/104 products, multiple industry trade 

groups tracking PC/104 sales/growth, and 

an independent magazine titled PC/104 

Embedded Solutions dedicated to PC/104 

products. (You’re reading it now.) The 

book-to-bill ratio for semiconductors 

continues to be steady with indications 

of improvement over previous quarters. 

14 

Number of years the consortium has been in existence 

78 

Number of active consortium members as of January 1, 2006 

150+ 

Estimated number of PC/104, EBX, and EPIC manufacturers in 2005 

1,000+ 

Estimated number of CPU and I/O board options available 

$0 M 

1991 dollar revenue associated with PC/104 products 

$52 M 

1998 estimated dollar revenue associated with PC/104 products* 

$306.9 M 

2004 estimated dollar revenue associated with PC/104 (including EBX and EPIC) products* 

$416.5 M 

2008 forecasted dollar revenue associated with PC/104 (including EBX and EPIC) products* 

$3.6 B 

2004 estimated dollar revenue associated with all embedded products* 

$4.6 B 

2008 forecasted dollar revenue associated with all embedded products* 

* Source: Venture Development Corp., www.vdc-corp.com 


PC/104 Embedded Solutions

Economic conditions in the United States as 

well as globally, while not robust, are stable 

and appear to support future expansion. 

In short, the industry is healthy; PC/104 

and small form factor “design wins” are 

growing and, as a result, leading PC/104 

manufacturers will continue to thrive. The 

future looks good. So what’s missing? 

From my perspective, what’s missing is 

increased participation by PC/104 vendors 

and suppliers who were not present 

at this year’s strategic planning session 

and who forgo involvement in consortium 

matters. There were 8 firms represented at 

this year’s program, yet there are 78 active 

members and in excess of 150 independent 

organizations involved directly or 

indirectly with PC/104 products. By the 

end of the decade, forecasted revenue for 

PC/104 and small form factor boards will 

approach one-half billion dollars. Last 

I checked, that’s a fairly sizable pile of 

cash. If it were my money (and some of it 

is), I’d want to be involved in the consortium’s 

management and future plans. 

The consortium is a powerful force in 

the embedded industry. Participants at 

this year’s meeting are seeking to ensure 

our long-term success, assuming leadership 

positions, and making decisions 

that have an impact on the entire PC/104 

community. PC/104 members who are 

not currently participating as board directors 

are encouraged to do so. In addition, 

PC/104 suppliers who are not currently 

members have a strong incentive to join 

in the discussion to help ensure our longterm 

success. After all, there is strength in 

numbers, and the more active participants 

we have, the more vital the organization 

will become. 

For more information, 

contact the Consortium: 

PC/104 Embedded Consortium 

490 2nd Street, Suite 301 

San Francisco, CA 94107 

Tel: 415-243-2104 

Fax: 415-836-9094 

E-mail: info@pc104.org 

Website: www.pc104.org 

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PC/104 Embedded Solutions 

Spring 2006 /

Internal system cabling 101 

By Joel Huebner 

This Fundamentals 101 column will 

address the PC/104 embedded system 

design issue of efficient internal cabling 

and will provide helpful information to 

aid engineers in eliminating some of 

the common problems that internal 

connectors and cabling can cause. 

In the beginning 

In the beginning stages of PC/104 embedded 

system design, engineers should 

seriously consider the internal cabling 

requirements for interconnecting individual 

PC/104 circuit boards to the external 

enclosure connectors and other internal 

devices. A system-level wiring diagram 

is always a good starting point. More 

important, careful review and analysis 

of physical cable sizes, types of cables, 

and the sensitivity of the signals within 

the cables and their relative placement 

to other internal cables is key to design 

success. 

“Getting down to the wire” 

To start, an engineer would commonly 

create a three-dimensional CAD drawing 

of the embedded system enclosure showing 

the placement of the circuit boards, 

the power supply, and any off-board components. 

This three-dimensional CAD 

drawing typically identifies and measures 

everything “except” the internal cabling 

required “within” the enclosure. It is not 

uncommon for a serious design issue to 

surprisingly appear when assembling 

the first complete system prototypes. For 

example, the internal cabling may take up 

more space than that expected or, worse, 

there may not be enough room for some 

of the internal cables. This problem can 

quickly develop into a serious design 

issue if the internal cabling restricts 

airflow for internal system cooling or 

the cable is just a little bit too short. In 

addition, forcing the cable connection 

can create mechanical stresses on the 

circuit board and cable. 

Cables 

Typically, the connectors on individual 

PC/104 circuit boards dictate the type of 

cable that should be utilized. This could 

range from shielded cables to ribbon 

cables to twisted pair or individual wires. 

(Refer to Figure 1 for a photo example.) 

The design engineer still must determine 

if the type of cable will maintain the 

signal integrity requirements for each 

type of transmission signal. In addition, 

the engineer must review the required 

cabling type and physical routing for 

the noise environment that may be present 

within the enclosure itself, as well as 

the environmental conditions the embedded 

system will be exposed to in the end 

application. A lot of time can be wasted 

debugging a recurring system failure only 

to realize that a sensitive, low-voltage 

signal was inadvertently routed next to a 

noisy power supply line. 

Board-level connectors 

The environmental system requirements 

and system repair requirements will 

determine the type of connectors needed 

when selecting PC/104 circuit boards 

and mating cables. Embedded systems 

that might be exposed to an environment 

consisting of shock and/or vibration 

may require a type of locking connector. 

Embedded systems that might have multiple 

people servicing them or any type of 

future upgrade capabilities may require 

restricted use of multiple identical connectors 

and that all connectors be keyed. 

Design engineers must seriously consider 

Murphy’s Law for embedded systems 

that utilize connectors. If a connector is 

capable of backwards installation or if 

a user can accidentally swap two cables 

because each utilizes the same connector, 

at some point in the future one of these 

mishaps may occur. If you have a special 

connector that requires a particular 

substitution on a vendor’s circuit board, 

as long as it does not require a change to 

the bare board footprint and mechanically 

there is sufficient clearance, many PC/104 

vendors will work with you to install a 

custom connector that meets your embedded 

system design requirements. 

Putting it all together 

It is always important to design an embedded 

system that utilizes the best choice of 

circuit boards and the proper enclosure to 

meet the end application’s design requirements. 

But it is equally important to take 

into account the end system’s internal 

cables and connectors to satisfy the space 

requirements, signal integrity requirements, 

and environmental requirements. 

For more information, e-mail Joel at 

jhuebner@jacyl.com. 

The initial enclosure drawings should 

include internal cabling and routing 

with an accurate representation of cable 

size, flexibility, and mechanical interference 

associated with all the other system 

components. 

Figure 1 

10 / Spring 2006 PC/104 Embedded Solutions

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A closer look at small form factors 

By Stefan Baginski 

Regardless of their professed support for 

open architectures, many, if not most, 

vendors try to lock their customers into 

product dependence. The best way to do 

this is to close them into a solution that 

they cannot switch from or that is too 

expensive to change. And that statement 

applies to all form factors. But why then 

do so many new formats still crop up? 

Besides the most established computer 

form factors such as VME, CompactPCI, 

PC/104, and others, there is a thriving 

market for smaller-size SBCs. Some 

examples include computers-on-chip, 

biscuits, EBX, ETX, and myriad smaller 

boards with more or less “established” 

interfaces. 

Europe is especially blessed with such 

novelties, as its techno-economic conditions 

and market segmentation provide 

excellent groundwork to divert from 

established standards. Some form factors 

are entirely proprietary, some even 

include open architectures backed by 

international standards bodies, and some 

not – perhaps not yet. However, many 

of these form factors find their way into 

our daily lives, or could do so soon. For 

comparative reasons, we’ll concentrate 

on SBCs or Systems-On-Modules, of 

which board sizes do not exceed 160 mm 

(approximately 6-1/4") in length. 

Prevalent market drivers 

What makes these product forms proliferate, 

or diversify, from established, 

well-entrenched standards, is a mixture of 

drivers and other conditions prevalent in a 

particular market segment or geographic 

area, such as: 

n Miniaturization 

n Security needs 

n Cost reduction 

n Legacy freedom 

Miniaturization 

The obvious driver is miniaturization, 

which means smaller and portable, especially 

for cellular applications, and sort 

of a smart gadget with perhaps reduced 

computing power, increased battery 

operating time, and lightweight features. 

Computers and smart devices require 

newer form factors that are much smaller, 

often busless, and that meet necessary 

networking requirements along with 

some limited graphics to power a small 

HMI display. 

Security needs 

Increasing security needs require thousands 

of handheld, inexpensive ID terminals 

to register all participants to events, 

such as Union of European Football 

Association (UEFA) events. Next year 

in Berlin there will be hundreds of thousands 

of soccer fans that will be “digitally 

labeled” and archived, even including 

their food or smoking preferences. Such 

terminals must be inexpensive, light, 

reliable, and easy to use. 

Cost reduction 

Another driver is cost reduction. Many 

“full-featured” form factors offer features 

for which end users are not prepared to 

pay. For example, backplanes and racks 

give useful modularity to larger systems, 

but they add cost to simpler solutions 

custom tailored to a particular application. 

Eliminating them from the solution 

brings cost down, improves weight, 

reliability, and logistics. 

Legacy freedom 

The next powerful driver is legacy freedom. 

For completely new systems, 

software engineers are developing new 

software without the burden of backward 

compatibility. Additionally, using 

new development tools speeds the process 

effectively. On a daily basis, we face 

applications that were never available 

before. 

Market segmentation in Europe, regardless 

of seeming unification, so far has left 

the region with many segmented markets. 

With languages and country industrial 

standards still in force, communications 

standards often obsolete systems still 

in use, forcing the vendors to provide 

products adapted to these varied environments. 

For example, in the transportation 

and telecommunications areas, less than 

2 percent of all railway engines ever cross 

national borders while driving international 

trains due to different voltage, 

current, frequency, and electric systems, 

not to mention track gauges. Business 

executives working across Europe may 

still use up to 10 phone plugs and perhaps 

up to 6 power adaptors for each of 

their laptops. In such an environment, it 

is hard to detect even why one standard or 

another was introduced in the first place. 

Computers-On-Modules 

There are many new SBCs in small form 

factors, but those most likely to be found on 

the market are Computers-On-Modules, 

and include the following: 

DIMM-PC 

The DIMM-PC is a highly integrated 

embedded solution and the smallest in 

size, measuring 40 mm x 68 mm (1.57" 

x 2.68"). Onboard software includes 

BIOS, with industrial extensions such 

as a remote control function, and usually 

has limited graphics that have been in 

use for some time. The CPU is usually 

x86-based and is very useful in embedded 

applications. The onboard core PC 

I/O includes keyboard, serial, parallel, 

IDE, and FD interfaces. Some models 

have Ethernet. DIMM-PC can support 

both flash and/or DRAM onboard for 

standalone operation. In addition, it is 

possible to employ I/O modules with a 

DIMM-PC for off-the-shelf expansion, 

making the entire solution rather flexible 

and complete as far as performance (386, 

486), graphics, and Ethernet, all with 

ISA bus peripherals. 

X-Board 

X-Board, with its PCI-bus expansion 

possibilities contributing to stronger CPU 

performance, seems to be a competent 

solution for mid- to high-performance 

solutions. Especially compatible with a 

range of CPUs, including x86, XScale, 

ARM, and MIPS, the X-Board could possibly 

replace the DIMM-PC for higher 

performance requirements. The board is 

only slightly larger that the DIMM-PC 

and measures 49 mm x 68 mm (1.93" x 

2.68"). It suits an attractive mix of interfaces 

for legacy-free I/O including USB, 

serial, IDE, Ethernet, graphics, and 

sound. Just as DIMM-PC, the X-board 


is used with an application-specific 

baseboard, which facilitates connection 

with the electronics drive and physical 

I/O connectors originating on the 

X-board. 

Embedded Electronic Brain 

Another Computer-On-Module, the Embedded 

Electronic Brain (E 2 Brain), 

is a good fit for embedded applications 

requiring RISC performance and low 

power consumption. The board size is 

75 mm x 115 mm (2.95" x 4.53"). All 

modules feature a common basic system 

and communications interface with PCI, 

LPC, I 2 C, Ethernet, and serial ports. For 

expansion, there are a number of optional 

interfaces such as CAN, UTOPIA, and 

others, making it a tailored solution to 

specific applications. Modules can qualify 

for extended temperature ranges from 

-40 °C to 85 °C, or even better. 

ETX 

The ETX form factor can accommodate 

full PC functionality and highperformance 

CPUs as needed. The board 

size is 95 mm x 114 mm (3.74" x 4.49"). 

Typically, it features a Pentium M series 

CPU, offering good compromise between 

performance and power consumption. 

The board has an integrated ISA or PCI 

bus for peripherals on the baseboard. 

ETXexpress 

Similar to the ETX board is the 

ETXexpress, a board that offers complete 

multimedia-capable cores suitable for 

high-level applications and high performance. 

PCI Express is the primary data 

path for upcoming x86-based systems. 

PCI 2.1 32-bit interfacing can still 

support non-PCI Express components, 

such as PCI plug-in cards, as ETXexpress 

communications will continue to support 

the PCI bus for legacy applications. 

ETXexpress comes with the latest highperformance 

interface technologies 

such as GbE, Serial ATA, USB 2.0, dual 

channel DDR2 for maximum memory 

bandwidth, ExpressCard for hot-plugable 

I/O cards, dual channel Low Voltage 

Differential Signaling (LVDS) for high 

resolution, and Serial Digital Video 

Output (SDVO) for maximum display 

flexibility. All are suitable for use with 

an application-specific baseboard that 

provides interfaces and peripherals. 

EPIC 

EPIC is a well-established U.S. standard 

with its extension EPIC/CE or PM. It 

offers Pentium M embedded solutions 

and is not considered a small form factor 

as its board size, 115 mm x 165 mm 

(4.53" x 6.50"), is larger than JRex. 

Another form factor is ePanel, which is a 

graphic-oriented SBC for a mobile panel 

PC. Its board size is still bigger and measures 

140 mm x 180 mm (6.50" x 7.09"). 

JREX is a 3.5" board. This form factor 

offers low power consumption, lowto 

mid-CPU performance, and limited 

expandability, all in a relatively small 

board size measuring 102 mm x 147 mm 

(4.02" x 5.79"). It includes keyboard, 

LAN, USB, VGA/LCD, COM1, IDE, 

LPT, and FDC interfaces. It comes in 

two additional board sizes, specifically, 

63.5 mm and 133.35 mm (2.5" and 5.25"), 

but these sizes are not as popular as the 

88.90 mm (3.5") size. Processors in this 

form factor include Pentium III, VIA 

Eden, Pentium M, AMD Geode, and 

others. 

Core modules 

Core modules are highly integrated 29 mm 

x 35 mm (1.14" x 1.38") microprocessor 

boards with VGA and LAN capabilities. 

Typically, the baseboard is part of the 

development kit, which shortens the 

development process and reduces time 

to market. This board may be reduced, 

custom tailored, or eliminated for the 

production run. 

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PC/104 Embedded Solutions Spring 2006 / 13


As such, they can hardly play a role in the 

SBC category. Instead, they are widely 

used as extension modules with individual 

functions, rather than a system 

on a very small footprint. Simply, we are 

only approaching a level of system integration 

suitable for such a small form 

factor. Some vendors call their modules 

core modules, even when they rather 

accurately represent the well-established 

PC/104 form factor. 

CommExpress 

A very promising technology, among 

others that Kontron is initiating and promoting 

and that PICMG is regulating, is 

CommExpress. It is similar to the ETX 

and ETXexpress form factors. The board 

size is 125 mm x 95 mm, and it could 

be 18 mm thick as opposed to the ETX 

12.5 mm. It offers more features and 

needs more power than the ETX. It has 

up to eight built-in USB 2.0-compliant 

ports and up to three GbE ports. Graphics 

come in composite- and componenttype, 

plus S-Video. Power supply is 12 V. 

A general-purpose PCI Express is available 

and four SATA ports as well as LPC 

and BIOS on the module or the carrier 

board, or both. Watch for more of these 

form factor boards on the market. 

What lies ahead for these small 

form factors? 

It is very difficult, if not impossible, to 

predict how each of the technologies 

mentioned will fare in the future. To look 

in my crystal ball to know or to even 

attempt a projection is futile. 

All of those already de facto standards 

or in-the-making standards are finding 

their purpose all over the world. The 

implementation drive is varied but powerful, 

captivating the market. Shorter 

time to market, lower implementation 

costs, miniaturization needs, operational 

time extensions, application development 

time, or whatever the reason, has brought 

them into existence. 

How the established vendors of larger 

formats are responding to their challenge 

is not clear. Some already adopt new standards 

while maintaining existing product 

lines. Some still sit on the fence waiting 

for the market to settle. The market will 

never settle. The market continuously 

demands new products. And when new 

form factors provide benefits to the end 

user and to the OEM, and when they 

shorten time to market, make implementation 

easier, are cheaper, smaller, easier 

to use or carry, they are going to be seen 

in Europe, North America, and everywhere 

– standards or not. 

It seems normal for trade organizations – 

VITA, PICMG, the PC/104 Consortium, 

CiA, or others – to adopt or gladly bless the 

specification and start to regulate it. The 

PC/104 Consortium (www.PC104.org) is 

already doing this, as they have adopted the 

PCI Express standard, and Tom Barnum 

is writing proudly about recent adoptions 

of EBX and EPIC standards (see PC/104 

Embedded Solutions, Fall 2005, Volume 9 

Number 4, page 8). 

There is plenty of investment poured into 

development and marketing of such new 

solutions, and all of them would find their 

way to the market as they all offer various 

benefits. 

Individually, it is hard to predict the 

degree of that success. Some standards 

adopted by a single company with no 

second source might not do as well as 

those companies that sought partnerships 

attempting to leverage their own technical 

prowess and trying to convince others 

to see the benefits of their technology by 

either outright sharing it, or by carving 

it into pieces where each partner holds a 

specialized know-how bit. 

By doing this technology “leveraging,” 

those companies hope to gain the critical 

mass to press the market to adopt their 

technology, and they certainly would 

succeed. Still others, such as Kontron, 

are prime examples of large enterprises 

that confidently release their technology 

to others and allow PICMG to regulate it 

(for example, CommExpress), knowing 

there are others who would join in hoping 

to ride on such an established reputation, 

leadership position, and brand name. 

As an aid to try to quantify the market for 

such a group of products generally known 

as small form factors and Systems-On- 

Modules, refer to the OpenSystems Publishing 

Selection Guide in the Fall 2005 

issue of PC/104 Embedded Solutions. In 

addition, industry analysts such as the 

Gartner Group or others would be happy 

to quantify such projections. 

For more information, e-mail Stefan at 

sbaginski@opensystems-publishing.com. 



Hardware 

Cluster Computing 

Case study: 

FPGA-PCI104 enables cluster computing distributed switch 

By Graham Campbell, PhD, and Daniel T. O’Leary 

Ether2 Corp. had acquired the rights to a new communications 

technology and wanted to demonstrate it with a prototype that 

interconnected off-the-shelf PCs so that they could operate as a 

distributed cluster of computers. Prototypes of digital communications 

systems are typically built using FPGAs, but there were no PCI FPGA 

development boards available with the right mix of features. The solution 

was to utilize the FPGA-PCI104, a PCI-104 form factor board offered 

by Tri-M Systems. This article describes the design considerations that 

led to the selection of the FPGA-PCI104 and the steps taken to use it 

while implementing the Distributed Queue Switch Architecture (DQSA) 

Network Interface Card (NIC) in an off-the-shelf PC. 

functions but that used a conventional 

10/100BASE-TX Ethernet physical layer 

interface driving CAT5 cables. 

Prototypes of new digital communications 

systems, such as the custom DQSA 

NIC, are typically built using FPGAs. 

But there were no “PC style” PCI-FPGA 

development boards available with a mix 

of I/O features suitable for a DQSA NIC. 

The solution was to utilize the Tri-M 

FPGA-PCI104. 

The task 

Ether2 is a start-up company based in Los 

Angeles, CA and Vancouver, BC. The 

company had obtained an exclusive license 

from the Illinois Institute of Technology 

for a new, patented communications 

switching technology. Ether2 had limited 

resources yet wanted to build a prototype 

that would demonstrate the technology 

in a cluster computing environment. The 

switching technology, DQSA, requires 

only a DQSA NIC in each of the clustered 

computers; all switching is managed in 

the NICs, so no central router or switch 

is required except for a simple hub at the 

center of the network. 

High-performance computing at one 

time was the realm of very expensive, 

often custom-designed, supercomputers 

such as Cray One, IBM, and Deep Blue. 

However, this type of computing is 

increasingly carried out using clusters 

of standard PCs or Macs that are interconnected 

by a switch. A given problem 

is solved by partitioning it and sending 

each segment to a separate processor that 

solves that part of the problem in parallel 

with all the other processors. In many 

such problems, it is necessary for the processors 

to periodically communicate with 

each other and to stop processing until 

they receive a response. 

The computers are interconnected using 

standard network technologies, such as 

Ethernet, using CAT5 cables and switches. 

Thus, the speed of the switch – that is, 

the latency or time required to establish 

a circuit through the switch – can have a 

significant impact on the performance of 

the supercomputer. The choices for the 

switches range from very low-cost, offthe-shelf 

“consumer” Ethernet switches 

to custom non-blocking switches such as 

the Myricom Myrinet switch. In general, 

the more expensive the switch, the lower 

the latency. Typical switch latencies range 

from 3 µs to more than 100 µs. 

Ether2’s DQSA technology eliminates the 

need for a switch and, instead, places all 

computers on a common bus. A common 

bus could be regarded as a bottleneck, 

but if there is sufficient bandwidth, a 

simple common bus will provide better 

performance than a non-blocking switch. 

Transmission speeds of 40 Gbps are now 

available in the Sonet hierarchy (OC768), 

and equivalent Ethernet components are 

under development. A DQSA distributed 

switch could perform for a large class 

of programs as well as, or better than, a 

much more costly, low-latency custom 

switch. A plus factor is that the latency 

of a DQSA distributed switch decreases 

as transmission speed increases, with 

latency of less than 0.25 µs possible at 

40 Gbps. 

The role of the prototype 

Although DQSA is well-documented and 

several proof-of-concept systems had 

been built, Ether2 required a new prototype 

system to measure performance and 

to demonstrate to potential investors. The 

best approach seemed to be to build the 

new prototype cluster system using offthe-shelf 

PCs, with each PC hosting a 

custom NIC that implemented the DQSA 

The FPGA-PCI104 contains an Altera 

Cyclone FPGA, a PCI-compliant interface, 

and an innovative, highly flexible 

daughtercard capability. It was used 

for the custom NICs for a four-node, 

PC-based cluster system utilizing DQSA 

at 100 Mbps. The daughtercard capability 

was the key feature that made it 

possible to design and build a small 

number of custom NICs. 

It should be noted that DQSA is suitable 

for use at any speed and over other physical 

media such as optical fiber, coaxial cable, 

and wireless. However, since 100 Mbps 

CAT5 wiring and technology is relatively 

simple and well-understood, Ether2 chose 

to do the prototype system at that speed. 

The hardware 

The Tri-M FPGA-PCI104 (see Figure 1) 

contains an Altera Cyclone FPGA; there 

is a choice of using a 4,000, 12,000, or 

20,000 Logic Element Cyclone. There is 

also a full PCI-104 target interface, plus 

various support circuits such as a 60 MHz 

oscillator (with an SMB connector for an 

external oscillator), a real-time counter 

with SuperCap backup, and an SmBus 

interface. 

Furthermore, and of key interest to Ether2, 

there is a set of connectors that provides 

a highly flexible daughtercard system 

featuring four identical connectors, each 

with 24 pins directly wired to its own set 

of unique pins on the Cyclone FPGA, 

plus 10 more FPGA signals shared among 

all the connectors. This daughtercard 

capability let Ether2 design a relatively 


simple, easy-to-build, low-cost daughtercard 

for use in the prototype, which contained 

just the parts needed to support the 

10/100BASE-TX Ethernet physical layer 

for use with CAT5 cables. 

Off-the-shelf versus custom 

In today’s electronics design world, there 

is a constant push to put components in 

ever-smaller, ever-denser packaging. The 

Cyclone FPGA on the FPGA-PCI104 

board is in a 324-contact, 19 mm square, 

1 mm contact spacing, Ball Grid Array 

package (and some other parts on the board 

have lead spacing as small as 0.6 mm). 

However, a big problem with such small, 

dense packaging is that, often and unfortunately, 

it is all but impossible to build 

“just a few prototypes” of a custom circuit 

that uses any recent state-of-the-art 

components such as FPGAs. Instead, an 

off-the-shelf board that has some or all of 

the desired small and densely packaged 

components is usually the only practical 

answer. 

But there is a drawback to most off-theshelf 

boards: Seldom do such boards have 

exactly the right mix of required I/O components 

for any particular application – in 

this case, an Ethernet 10/100BASE-TX 

PHY chip with associated CAT5 circuits 

and connector directly wired to a suitable 

FPGA. 

On the Tri-M FPGA boards, however, 

one-half of the Cyclone FPGA’s I/O pins 

(106 to be exact) connect directly and 

only to the four daughtercard connectors. 

The other FPGA pins connect to the 

PCI bus interface, the onboard auxiliary 

circuits, and power. Thus, the daughtercards 

can implement exactly, and only, 

whatever the required I/O circuitry is for 

a particular application. Moreover, if a 

particular I/O application does not need 

to use all four of the daughtercard connectors, 

the unused one(s) are available 

for other purposes. Tri-M has published a 

standardized set of daughtercard outlines 

and PCB layout template files. 

For Ether2’s DQSA prototype system, it 

was only necessary to design and build 

the daughtercard carrying a through-hole 

CAT5 connector/transformer, a surfacemount 

10/100BASE-TX PHY chip, and 

some resistors, capacitors, and so on. Lead 

spacing was large enough to accommodate 

hand-soldering. The PCB was four 

layers – not suitable for “basement lab” 

fabrication, perhaps – but much easier to 

design and much cheaper to make than 

the 10-layer PCB of the FPGA-PCI104. 

During development and system testing, 

and since the Ether2 NIC card only 

used two of the daughtercard sites, two 

Figure 1 


Hardware 

Cluster Computing 

of Tri-M’s standard daughtercards were 

also used. A triple RS-232 serial driver/ 

receiver board was used to dump debugging 

information from the DQSA functions 

in the FPGA out to a monitor, and a 

multi-LED card was used for status/event 

indications. 

Another unique feature of the FPGA- 

PCI104 proved of value to Ether2. The 

circuitry did not require the entire space 

available on a PCI-104 board, and so the 

board was “notched” at the sides, as shown 

in Figure 2, to allow greater height for the 

daughtercards. This configuration accommodates 

parts on daughtercards that are 

quite high (for example, a CAT5 RJ-45 

connector) but without increasing overall 

space requirements in PCI-104 systems. 

Only one final problem required a solution: 

The PCI-104 interface of the FPGA- 

PCI104 had to be adapted into a PC-style 

“desktop” PCI bus physical connector. 

The PCI-104 bus fully complies with 

the 32-bit PCI standard, so adapting was 

simple: mount the FPGA-PCI104 on a 

PCI-104 to PCI bus adapter (Winsystems’ 

PCI-PPM). See Figure 3 for a photo of the 

final DQSA NIC board. 

Figure 2 

As a result, Ether2’s requirement for a NIC 

that could support DQSA and, moreover, 

one wherein it was possible and affordable 

to build “just a few,” was satisfied. 

Project complete 

Ten Ether2 NIC boards and two hubs were 

completed on time, adequately supporting 

two, four-node DQSA systems plus 

spares. The systems are now undergoing 

initial testing and will soon be serving 

their intended purpose – demonstrating 

the DQSA technology and generating 

performance statistics. 


Distributed Queue Switch 

Architecture 

The DQSA, developed at the Illinois 

Institute of Technology, addresses a 

major problem in communications: 

The world’s circuit-switched telecom 

infrastructure is ill-suited for the packet 

traffic that today dominates communications, 

while the router-based, 

packet-switched infrastructure that has 

been installed to support this packet 

traffic and the Internet is ill-suited 

to providing quality of service. Even 

the combination of these two distinct 

communications technologies still 

does not provide a level of service that 

supports the long sought-after goal of 

voice, video, and data convergence. 

DQSA allows the basic circuit-switched 

communications infrastructure to operate 

simultaneously as a circuit-switched 

network and as a packet-switched network, 

thereby eliminating the need for 

separate networks dedicated only to 

packet switching and the routers they 

utilize (refer to Sidebar Figure 1). 

DQSA provides this simultaneous 

support of packet traffic and circuit- 

Application 

TCP 

Network (such as IP) 

DQSA 

Physical Layer 

Sidebar Figure 1 

oriented traffic in wireless networks, 

local, metropolitan, and wide area 

networks, satellite networks, and in 

virtually all other types of communications 

networks regardless of the medium, 

distance covered, or transmission 

speed. DQSA provides efficient switching 

of short messages – a particular 

requirement of cluster computing. 

Papers, simulations, and other 

material on DQSA are available at: 

www.iit.edu/~dqrap 

DQSA 


Figure 3 

Graham Campbell is currently the 

chief science officer of Ether2. He was 

a professor of computer science and 

engineering at the Illinois Institute of 

Technology until his retirement, and 

thereafter conducted research in the 

field of communications. 

Dan O’Leary is currently a lead design 

engineer with Ether2, responsible for 

the development of hardware, firmware, 

and FPGA IP for DQSA products. He 

has more than 30 years of experience 

designing embedded computer products 

and systems, microprocessor/DSP/ 

mixed-signal digital/analog circuits, 

and related software. 

For more information, contact Graham 

and Dan at: 

Ether2 Corp. 

1344 Martel Ave., Ste. 105 

Los Angeles, CA 90046 

Tel: 310-913-4383 

E-mail: info@ether2.com 

Website: www.ether2.com 




Software 

Motor Control 

Cut product development time and costs with PC/104 

and microcontroller platforms 

By Walter Calmette and Glenn de Caussin 

PC/104 offers an ideal platform for controlling the motors that run heavy 

equipment. For simplicity and I/O convenience, commercial-off-the-shelf 

Microcontrollers (MCUs) with integrated I/O can be adapted to PC/104 

to create extremely efficient controller designs. Additionally, consumer 

PDAs make excellent development tools for the controller and are useful 

in the end design as operator interface consoles. 

Using MCUs as a basic building block 

of customized PC/104 boards reduces 

the time and cost of board development, 

allowing designers to focus on the valueadded 

aspects of a motion control solution. 

Rather than investing six months 

and corresponding hard costs in developing 

a system that may or may not go 

into full production, a custom PC/104 

solution can be developed in as little as 

four weeks, and costs can be substantially 

cut. In addition to cutting time and cost, 

PC/104 eases the production “buy/make” 

decision by transitioning to a PC/104 

bus-less “make” product with a minimal 

amount of redesign. 

Another consideration in motor and 

machine control is the operator interface. 

This interface provides valuable feedback 

to an engineer during development, and 

it provides critical machine information 

to the user, service personnel, and production 

floor while in service. Handheld 

PDAs have a high-tech look and feel 

and do not require a huge development 

investment. Using a PDA can eliminate the 

need to purchase and develop a separate 

handheld terminal system. A PDA provides 

a low-cost path for a high-resolution 

color touch screen, graphics, Wi-Fi connectivity, 

and nonvolatile memory, and its 

expansion slot(s) enable the addition of 

other high-tech options. Together, commercial 

off-the-shelf PC/104 modules 

and PDAs offer low-cost ways to control 

heavy equipment. 

Indexer example 

Calmotion is an industrial automation 

company focusing on delivering open 

standard solutions to engineering professionals. 

The company’s motor drives 

are designed to be part of an integral 

PC/104 bus, which in rugged versions 

provides a compact structure upon which 

to build a customized motor controller 

using industry standard software and 

hardware. PC/104 allows virtually any 

combination of digital/analog I/O with 

wired/wireless networks at a fraction of 

the usual cost compared to closed proprietary 

systems. 

In conjunction with motor drives, the 

company uses PC/104 in a low-cost controller 

powered by the PIC18F8722 from 

Microchip (see Figure 1). The MCU 

offers I/O and real-world flexibility in 

control applications while leveraging 

the versatility and wide range of PC/104 

I/O boards. 

Figure 1 

Recently, a customer discovered that 

parts for their old indexer control had 

been discontinued, and a redesign using 

longer life-cycle parts was necessary. 

The issue was whether they would run 

out of parts before the controller could 

be redesigned. The Calmotion MC104P 

PC/104-based motor controller powered 

by a 40 MHz, 8-bit MCU handled the 

development and testing (see Figure 2 

for a block diagram of the development 

version). After adding all the features 

and functionality to the front end and 

proving that it worked, the PC/104 bus 

proved no longer necessary to the end 

production system. It was eliminated by 

using a high-end MCU, thus stripping out 

additional costs (see Figure 3 for a block 

diagram of the production version). 

MCU interface 

Most MCUs are not designed as bus-based 

devices but rather as standalone integrated 

CPUs. For proof-of-concept during a 

development stage, interfacing an MCU 

to a PC/104 ISA bus can sometimes prove 

challenging. A Dual-Port RAM (DPR) 

memory can be used between the MCU 

and the ISA bus to greatly simplify the 

design effort. 

The PC/104 address and data lines are 

straightforward. It may be tempting 

to select an MCU based on its ability 

to interface to the PC/104 bus, but the 

controller end product will more likely 

suffer if its peripherals are poorly suited 

for an application than if it has a clumsy 

PC/104 interface. When selecting an 

MCU, the designer has the choice of 

using I/O or memory space. Our experience 

in motor control leans towards 

choosing I/O, since it allows the most 

flexibility, ease of decoding, and has less 

chance of conflicting with other system 

peripherals. The MCU can then be integrated 

with the appropriate read/write 

PC/104 bus signals. 

Decoding is possible utilizing comparators 

or CPLD logic without much effort. In 

addition, most DPR units offer “mailbox” 

space that can be used to generate output 

interrupts on both sides of the memory 

and signal an interrupt to the MCU, or as 

an IRQ on the PC/104 side. The simultaneous, 

memory-access contention 

logic can add welcome-bus-wait states, 

eliminating the time spent designing and 

debugging a custom CPLD/FPGA solution. 

In addition, IDE software breakpoints 

can be used after reading a section 

of memory on the MCU side to debug 

drivers at runtime. 

Another option for a motor controller is 

to use an MCU with an external memory 

interface because it makes connecting to 

the DPR straightforward. This is espe- 


Figure 2 

cially true if the MCU’s external memory 

interface has dynamic bus-wait-state 

capability. If not, logic can be added to 

alert the micro in cases of memory access 

contention, such as when it and the 

PC/104 controller simultaneously access 

the same DPR location. 

Input pins capable of 

generating interrupts 

on MCUs are common. 

Connecting them to the 

“mailbox” output of 

the DPR on the micro 

side can interrupt the 

MCU, indicating that 

the PC/104 controller 

has sent a data packet. 

This setup minimizes 

response time. 

Without a memory 

interface 

Using MCUs without 

an external memory 

interface requires a 

little more user code 

intervention. However, 

in this case, low-cost 

MCUs can be used. 

MCUs without external 

memory interface I/O pins can be set up 

to simply “bit bang” the DPR to read and 

write data. The data lines of the DPR are 

connected to general-purpose pins of an 

MCU. To use an MCU in this manner, 

its general-purpose pins must be able 

Figure 3 

RSC #21 @ www.pc104online.com/rsc


Software 

Motor Control 

to dynamically configure data pins as 

inputs or outputs, or put them into highimpedance 

mode. To prevent a short condition, 

the micro and the DPR must not 

drive their respective data outputs at the 

same time. 

The obvious disadvantage of this methodology 

is the additional pin configuration 

instructions required prior to a read/write 

cycle. Unless there is a tremendous amount 

of data or instruction traffic that must take 

place between the MCU and the PC/104 

bus, the additional time delay when using 

this method is minimal. Although this is 

admittedly a crude manner in which to 

interface to the PC/104 bus, a low-cost 

flash MCU, such as the PIC18F8722 from 

Microchip, can offer surprisingly good 

performance. 

If the microprocessor has a Parallel Slave 

Port (PSP) peripheral, the data direction 

configuration commands can be omitted 

from the user code. Typically, the PSP 

peripheral facilitates the use of a microcontroller 

in a data-bus interface application. 

As the name implies, they operate 

in a slave mode whereby read, write, 

and chip-enable input pins dynamically 

configure the direction of the data pins 

by a master processor. Mock read, write, 

and chip-enable signals also need to be 

bit banged as if coming from a master 

processor. In this manner, much like a 

null modem cable, these signals are fed 

back into the PSP enable and read/write 

input pins and thus eliminate port direction 

configuration code. The PSP on the 

Microchip PIC18F452 is an example of 

a low-cost, 44-pin TQFP MCU that we 

have used in this fashion. 

Visual user interface 

Since the goal is rapid development time 

while still designing a low-cost motor 

controller, it’s handy to use off-the-shelf 

development tools. It is even handier if 

those tools can be used for an operator 

interface in the final controller equipment. 

Consumer handheld PDAs offer an 

attractive platform to meet both of these 

goals (refer to Figures 4a, 4b, and 4c). 

The most popular handheld devices use 

either the Palm or Windows OS. Windows 

devices tend to cost more than their Palm 

counterparts, but they usually offer more 

features when it comes to expansion and 

connectivity via Wi-Fi. The latest version 

of Microsoft Visual Studio .NET Professional 

supports the compact framework 

Figure 4a 

Figure 4b 

Figure 4c 

of .NET. This compact framework is the 

foundation of devices that use Windows 

CE, Pocket PC, and Smart phones. 

The biggest advantage of using this 

development tool is the portability of 

applications from desktop/laptop computers 

to handheld devices. If portability 

of PDA/PC code is not a concern, other 


RSC# 24 @ www.pc104online.com/rsc 


Software 

Motor Control 

alternatives exist, such as the development 

system available from NS Basic 

Corporation. They have two similar packages 

that support application development 

for either Palm or Windows CE. As 

an example, a development system from 

NS Basic allows designers to create a 

software scope on a Palm OS PDA that’s 

useful for motor drive tuning. 

Most PDAs have serial port capabilities 

either directly or through some type of 

interface cable. The trend with the newer 

PDAs leans toward a serial interface but 

with TTL-level signals. The cables used 

to convert TTL to RS-232 are typically 

parasitic and receive their power from 

the RTS signal via an RS-232 port. For 

designers planning to use this type of 

interface, it’s essential to ensure that 

the RTS has the appropriate voltage. 

Programming an application is fairly 

straightforward with one exception: The 

Palm OS and some Windows development 

systems ignore null characters. 

That is, they assume that nulls are white 

spaces and can be ignored. This result 

most often presents an issue when using 

protocols that use all the binary numbers 

0 to 255. Choosing the correct method 

when reading the serial port will overcome 

this assumption. 

There are obviously ways around this, 

but it’s critical to be aware of them at the 

outset. RS-232 is the easiest and lowestcost 

interface to develop and accommodates 

a straightforward laptop connection 

as well. A number of off-the-shelf RS-232 

converters allow connection to TCP/IP, 

Modbus, CAN, or Bluetooth, which can 

be an effective way to keep engineering 

development costs down. If a USB interface 

is desired, at least one device must be 

the host. USB-to-serial converters exist, 

but they will only work with a host such 

as a computer. A USB-only PDA acts as 

a slave device, not a master. The PDA 

can only communicate using USB if the 

product has been designed as a host. 

Motor control: 

Putting it all together 

Starting with off-the-shelf PC/104 boards 

for proof-of-concept and evolving to 

developing custom PC/104 hardware 

with MCUs enables the use of such integral 

features as: 

n Many types of internal memory 

n Serial ports 

n Timers/counters 

n Interrupts 

n A/D converters 

n Watchdog timers 

This set of peripherals and capabilities 

simplifies circuit design and board layout. 

In turn, this configuration reduces development 

time and costs. 

Additionally, most MCUs come with 

low-cost development tools, which allow 

in-circuit programming/debugging without 

an operating system. Single stepping, 

variable watch windows, and the 

software breakpoints that are standard in 

most IDE packages speed the debugging 

and coding process. The “hockey puck” 

MPLAB ICD2 from Microchip connects 

MCUs with the development computer’s 

USB connectors. 

Other manufacturers offer similar devices 

in the same price range. C compilers 

are almost universally available, thereby 

reducing portability concerns. A number 

of MCUs have peripherals developed 

for such specific applications as motion 

and motor control, CAN, and Ethernet. 

Such peripherals minimize software 

development and eliminate additional 

hardware that might otherwise be 

required. 

Walter Calmette cofounded Calmotion 

LLC afer 5 years in sales management at 

Fadal Machining Centers and 11 years 

with Rockwell Automation in motor 

drive sales and application engineering. 

Walter received a BS in Physics from 

UCLA. 

Glenn de Caussin cofounded 

Calmotion LLC after 20 years in 

electronics and controls at Fadal 

Machining Centers where his last 

position was director of software/ 

controls. Glenn received a BSEE from 

Cal State Northridge (CSUN). 

For more information, contact Walter 

and Glenn at: 

Calmotion, LLC 

9909 Topanga Canyon Blvd., #322 

Chatsworth, CA 91311 

Tel: 818-357-5826 

Fax: 818-357-5827 

E-mail: sales@calmotion.com or 

support@calmotion.com 

Website: www.calmotion.com 



Technology 

Bringing PCI Express to embedded applications 

By Phillip Menicos 

EPIC Express 

A new specification called EPIC Express is bringing the benefits 

of switch fabric architectures to mainstream embedded computing 

applications. Cooperatively developed by five leading embedded 

computer manufacturers – Ampro Computers, Micro/sys, Octagon 

Systems, VersaLogic, and WinSystems – EPIC Express gives equipment 

makers a straightforward migration strategy without obsoleting their 

existing hardware and software investment. 

EPIC Express has its roots in an SBC 

specification called Embedded Platform 

for Industrial Computing (EPIC), which 

debuted in mid-2004 with an overwhelmingly 

positive industry response. The 

main rationale behind the creation of 

EPIC, developed by the same five companies 

mentioned above, was real estate. 

EPIC Express combines a PC/104 connector 

for compatibility with legacy ISA 

boards and one to three PCI Express 

connectors for high-speed packet traffic 

(see Figure 1). 

Figure 1 

On one hand, the popular EBX SBC form 

factor, at 46 square inches, or 5.75" x 8", 

is too large for many embedded applications. 

On the other hand, the 13.5 square 

inches (3.575" x 3.77") of the PC/104 and 

PC/104-Plus alternative is too small for 

other embedded applications, requiring a 

multiple-board solution – always a more 

expensive approach. 

By defining a 29.4 square inch (4.528" x 

6.496") form factor, EPIC hits the sweet 

spot for a large number of embedded 

applications in such areas as automated 

test equipment, medical instrumentation, 

communications devices, transportation 

systems, semiconductor manufacturing 

gear, robotics, and military systems. 

Further, by specifying PC/104-Plus as 

its vehicle for mezzanine bus expansion, 

EPIC allows developers to leverage 

their existing investment in PC/104 

I/O boards. 

EPIC was also forward-looking at the 

time of its announcement. The EPIC 

group indicated that it had built flexibility 

into the specification so that a future 

version would address the switch fabric 

issue. EPIC Express is that version. 

PCI Express to the fore 

The multi-drop parallel bus architecture 

has been the workhorse of the computing 

industry for decades, but it is becoming 

somewhat dated. The next stage in 

the evolution of computer architecture 

encompasses switch fabric architectures, 

and the future belongs to these very 

high-speed point-to-point interconnects 

communicating via packets and based 

on Low-Voltage Differential Signaling 

(LVDS) technology. 

The Peripheral Component Interconnect 

(PCI) bus has long been the dominant 

parallel bus, having inherited that mantle 

from the Industry Standard Architecture 

(ISA) bus in the early 1990s. The great 

success of ISA and PCI motivated the 

creation of a number of industrial variations 

that define mechanical characteristics 

suitable to the rigors of embedded 

computing. 

One of these industrial variations, PC/104, 

gives ISA a unique expansion scheme 

utilizing stackable boards that require no 

backplane, card cage, or mounting frame. 

Its second generation, PC/104-Plus, 

combines a 32-bit, 33 MHz PCI bus with 

the legacy ISA bus of PC/104, bridging 

the two generations of computer buses, 

using the same form factor and stacking 

scheme. EPIC Express is the next 

step forward, bringing PCI Express into 

the fold. 

Why the need for switch fabrics? 

As higher speed peripheral interfaces 

become commonplace, the existing PCI 

bus, operating at a maximum of 132 MBps, 

cannot handle the data demands of these 

devices. For example, if both USB 2.0 and 

GbE expansion cards reside on the same 

PCI bus, there will be times when all of 

the bandwidth is consumed. In addition, 

high-end graphics controllers are seriously 

constrained by the PCI’s bandwidth 

limitation. 

“By defining a 29.4 square 

inch (4.528" x 6.496") 

form factor, EPIC hits the 

sweet spot for a large number 

of embedded applications 

in such areas as...robotics 

and military systems.” 

As for the selection made by the EPIC 

group from among today’s high-speed, 

point-to-point interconnects, PCI Express 

is a slam dunk. It has clearly established 

itself as the preferred follow-on to the 

PCI bus. Among it strengths, PCI Express 

adopts the familiar PCI software model, 

greatly simplifying migration, and it 

provides speeds well beyond PCI, plus 

great scalability. PCI Express is the obvious 

choice since, as the EPIC Express 

specification explains, it has “performance, 

scalability, wide market acceptance, 

and growing silicon availability 

worldwide.” 

At its current 2.5 GHz operating frequency, 

a single-lane (X1) PCI Express 

interface provides 2.5 Gbps of bandwidth 

unidirectionally and 5 Gbps bidirectionally. 

Accounting for the interface’s 8b/10b 

encoding scheme, that translates into 

250 MBps and 500 MBps. An X32 implementation 

pushes the PCI Express frontier 

out to 80 Gbps (8 GBps) unidirectional, 

160 Gbps (16 GBps) bidirectional. That’s 



Technology 

EPIC Express 

a lot of performance headroom, indeed. 

In addition, future speed-ups beyond the 

2.5 Gbps rate are already in the works. 

EPIC Express innovative 

configuration options 

EPIC Express replaces the 120-pin PCI 

connector of EPIC’s PC/104-Plus expansion 

site with one or more 28-pin PCI 

Express connectors. Three of these connectors 

fit the space previously occupied 

by one because serial interfaces require far 

fewer signal lines than parallel interfaces. 

The ISA-compatible connector of PC/104 

is retained by EPIC Express to leverage 

the hundreds of PC/104 I/O and custom 

boards now in the field. The photo in 

Figure 2 depicts the three-bank connector 

feature. The expansion board on this 

EPIC Express baseboard contains an ISAcompatible 

PC/104 connector (bottom) 

and three PCI Express connectors (top). 

The EPIC Express expansion connector 

accommodates up to four PCI Express 

lanes. Two configuration options are currently 

defined by the spec: the standard, 

or “thin,” single-connector configuration 

consisting of four X1 links; and the full, 

or “fat,” three-connector configuration, 

which combines four X1 links with two 

sets of X4 links. If future requirements 

call for larger lane counts, additional 

connectors could be incorporated for X8, 

X16, and X32 implementations. An X16 

configuration is, in fact, in the works to 

handle high-speed multimedia traffic. 

Figure 2 

EPIC Express supports stacks of up to 

four expansion boards, with the placement 

of the boards in the stack constrained 

by the onboard interface. PC/104 

boards must reside at the top of the stack, 

for example, above boards that also contain 

a PCI Express interface. Boards with 

larger PCI Express lane counts, such as 

X4, must reside below boards with fewer 

lanes, such as X1. 

In its day, the migration from PC-104 to 

PC/104-Plus presented technical challenges, 

and the transition to PCI Express 

in EPIC Express is no different. The 

major issue that had to be tackled was 

routing: how the point-to-point traffic 

on PCI Express lanes can be efficiently 

routed among boards in a stack to make 

the best use of the bandwidth it provides. 

The answer was a “next available 

lane” technique that also enhances interoperability 

and eliminates the need 

for jumpers, or Dual In-Line Package 

switches, when configuring the boards in 

a stack. 

Figure 3 

To avoid contention for particular lanes, 

PCI Express traffic is routed to the earliest 

(in the alphabet) available interface 

lane (refer to Figure 3) where, in EPIC 

Express jargon, it is “consumed,” establishing 

the point-to-point link. This 

eliminates the potential chaos that would 

ensue if different board manufacturers 

fielded divergent routing mechanisms. 

An EPIC Express system doesn’t care, in 

short, which PCI Express lane a particular 

packet travels on, just as long as it reaches 

its destination in a timely fashion. 


Figure 3 illustrates a conceptual model of 

an EPIC Express system. In this particular 

system, which has the maximum fourslot 

configuration, the baseboard contains 

four X1 and two X4 PCI Express links, 

plus a PC/104 bus. In this example configuration, 

I/O board #1 consumes an X4 

lane only, and I/O boards #3 and #4 each 

consume only an X1 lane. I/O board #2, 

in turn, consumes both an X1 lane and 

an X4 lane. In all cases, traffic shifts to 

the earliest available lane. Traffic on the 

baseboard’s B X1 lane, for example, is 

shifted to the A lane on I/O board #2 for 

transmission to I/O board #3. 

Variations on PCI Express 

The industrial variations of PCI frequently 

included a few variants on 

the basic commercial specification, as 

deemed suitable for targeted embedded 

applications. In addition, EPIC Express 

includes a few differences from commercial 

PCI Express. The most notable is the 

addition of discrete clock signals: three 

on the standard configuration, and six on 

the full configuration. 

Although source-synchronous clocking is 

not specified by PCI Express, the EPIC 

Express developers decided that having 

such clocking available is a good design 

practice for a very high-speed interface: 

sort of a belt and suspenders orientation. 

Further, discussions of second-generation 

PCI Express with speeds in excess of 

2.5 Gbps indicate that discrete clock signals 

will be incorporated into the spec. 

EPIC Express also departs from commercial 

PCI Express in incorporating +5 V 

and –12 V power lines. The optional Systems 

Management Bus and JTAG test 

lines are not supported. EPIC Express 

also rejects as inappropriate the PCI 

Express Wake signal, geared primarily 

towards mobile devices and the presence 

lines, which support live insertion and 

board withdrawal from a system. 

Draft release 0.8 of EPIC Express is 

available now at www.epic-express.org 

for industry consideration and feedback. 

Release 1.0 is expected to be completed 

by the end of 2005. 

Phillip Menicos 

has more than 

20 years of experience 

in electronic 

design. He has 

worked in the 

steel, medical, 

and embedded 

computer industries. He currently 

serves as a senior design engineer with 

Octagon Systems. 

For more information, contact 

Phillip at: 

Octagon Systems 

6510 W. 91st Ave. 

Westminster, CO 80031-2902 

Tel: 303-430-1500 

Fax: 303-426-8126 

Website: www.octagonsystems.com 

In summary, EPIC Express is an innovative 

bridge to the future, providing a form 

factor that suits a broad swath of embedded 

computing applications. By supporting 

legacy PC/104 bus boards within the 

context of an innovative PCI Express 

variation, EPIC Express provides the best 

of both worlds. Enabling systems that 

combine switch fabric technology (where 

ultimate performance is required) and 

bus-based technology (where adequate 

for the function), EPIC Express provides 

a painless evolutionary path to embedded 

computing systems that are at once flexible, 

scalable, and balanced. 



Special 

Going where no PC has gone before 

By Chris Bennetts 

Rugged, rural computing 

Small-form-factor, x86-based computers with low power 

consumption, rich integration, and robust designs have traditionally 

found their place in embedded and enthusiast markets. However, 

it now seems that these features can bring connectivity computing to 

emerging markets. Desktop PCs, when deployed in these markets, must 

overcome numerous technical challenges caused by intermittent and 

expensive power, environmental extremes, and damaging pollutants such 

as dust. As a result, Small Form Factor x86 computers (SFF PCs) such 

as Mini-ITX with their unique set of features are increasingly becoming 

the answer. Here are some of the challenges and solutions for deploying 

technology to this market. 

Technical challenges for 

emerging markets 

Expecting the largest increase in PC 

growth over the next four years to come 

from emerging markets (Source: IDC), 

a number of technology companies are 

focusing on bringing affordable and 

accessible connectivity, computing, and 

entertainment capabilities to nations such 

as Brazil, China, India, and Russia. Of 

these four nations alone, the projected 

IT spending will grow from U.S. $60 billion 

in 2005 to approximately U.S. $105 

billion in 2009 according to IDC. While 

this sounds like the perfect opportunity 

for “white box” PC vendors to sell large 

quantities of cheap or used PCs into these 

markets, the reality is quite different. 

With their large form factor and bulky 

case design, shipping to these nations 

alone can turn a sub-U.S. $300 PC dispatched 

from Taiwan to Brazil into a U.S. 

$450 PC by the time it arrives. 

Cost and supply of power 

Explosive growth and energy consumption 

are outstripping the supply of 

reliable and affordable power to communities 

increasing the cost of operation 

for a PC. For example, power in Mali, 

Africa costs six times that in the United 

States. Therefore, a normal desktop PC, 

which consumes approximately 150 W 

of power, would cost in a year of alwayson 

operation about U.S. $600 (based on 

U.S. $0.08 per KWh x 6), increasing the 

total cost of a sub-U.S. $300 computer 

to about U.S. $900 (plus shipping costs) 

over the first year. 

more than 15 percent and power shortages 

at times of peak demand (Source: 

www.platts.com), intermittent power 

supply is also an issue. In 2001, for 

example, households had to cut usage by 

20 percent or else face having their electricity 

cut off for up to six days and paying 

heavy surcharges (Source: BBC News). 

Pollutants and dust 

Rapid economic growth in emerging markets 

also generates increased pollution 

and dust – by-products of industry that 

outpace what the country’s infrastructure 

can tolerate. In 2001, for example, China 

produced 13 percent of the world’s carbon 

emissions (Source: www.eia.doe.gov) and 

in 2000, the amount of sulphur dioxide 

(SO 2 

) released into the atmosphere by 

coal-fired power stations in China was 

approximately 27.3 mm tons (Source: 

www.pnl.gov). As a result, typical desktop 

PCs using normal cooling fans to push air 

over the processor and components inadvertently 

suck in these pollutants, causing 

a buildup of dust, which reduces the flow 

of air and increases the system’s temperature. 

This result causes static damage to 

components and, when sulphur is present, 

can erode the copper on circuits (see 

Figure 1, courtesy of Computer Force). 

Editor’s note: The author has made available 

more photos from his colleagues’ recent travels 

to several rural environments. Check them out 

on our website in a more expansive version of 

this article at www.pc104online.com. 

“...Mini-ITX mainboards 

enable designs that 

eliminate the need for 

cooling vents, thereby 

preventing dust and 

pollutant clogging, as 

well as static damage to 

internal components.” 

Just as dust buildup, climate, too, can be 

a major factor affecting normal desktop 

PC operation in emerging markets. For 

example, the average annual 24-hour temperature 

in places such as Lagos, Nigeria 

and Agra, India is 79.7 ºF. In Timbuktu, 

it’s 82 ºF. Compare this temperature to 

the annual 24-hour temperature average 

in Los Angeles of 61.7 ºF, and in Tokyo 

it’s 58.1 ºF. Combine these temperature 

extremes with the presence of pollutants, 

and desktop PCs deployed in emerging 

market regions can face real challenges 

in maintaining reliable operation. Figure 

2 shows a cooling fan found in an 

actual Internet café in Africa. 

In Brazil, where energy generators 

commonly experience system losses of 

Figure 1 

Figure 2 



Special 


Solutions for emerging markets 

Emerging markets have been dealing 

with the above-mentioned technical challenges 

for other products such as radios 

for a number of years. For example, in 

Mali, Africa, solar panels provide power 

to local radio station Boorem Inaly 

(Figure 3). 

Computers have for the most part failed 

to cross the “digital divide,” due in part to 

the key technical challenges faced while 

electrical appliances converged into 

emerging markets. Table 1 lists some of 

those challenges. 

If regular desktop PCs cannot overcome 

these challenges, what can? The answer 

lies in using industrial embedded products. 

They have the potential for overcoming 

such environmental challenges with 

robust and fanless designs, low power 

consumption, and low heat generation. 

Embedded technology is ideal for sustainable 

emerging markets such as rural 

areas. The ARM-based microprocessors 

so popular in cell phones are a perfect 

example of technology designed for lowpower 

harsh environments but they do not 

provide adequate performance. Emerging 

markets want the same computing and 

connectivity functionality as everyone 

else: Users want word processors, Internet 

connectivity, or the ability to play digital 

Figure 3 

videos. Many users also need Voice-over- 

IP (VoIP) and video conferencing facilities, 

as some that live in emerging market 

regions may not be able to read or write, 

and the computer that they are using may 

not have local language support. 



Technical challenges 

Transportation costs, methods, and potential damage 

Damage caused by excessive heat 

Damage caused by pollutants 

Cost of power in emerging regions 

Intermittent power supply in emerging regions 

India, for example, has more than 18 subregions, 

each with a number of local languages 

(Source: www.lonelyplanet.com). 

Imagine trying to find the right software 

language pack to install there. This language 

obstacle is why computers, such 

as the AMD PIC, which is a ruggedized 

x86-based PC appliance (see Figure 4, 

courtesy of AMD), and the MIT Media 

Lab Laptop (U.S. $100) have received so 

much attention as of late. The Media Lab 

Laptop is x86-based and has a “windup 

handle” to power the device. 

Table 1 

small footprint of just 6.7" x 6.7" and rich 

feature integration, these mainboards 

facilitate the design of innovative solutions 

that can overcome the technical 

challenges of deployment in emerging 

market technology. 

VIA’s Mini-ITX mainboards have long 

been known for their ability to run utilizing 

car batteries and solar panels. Back 

in 2004, VIA demonstrated the pedalpowered 

PC, using a normal bicycle to 

recharge a car battery to power a VIA 

EPIA Mini-ITX-based SFF PC, whereby 

one hour of pedaling would provide up 

to eight hours of operation before the 

battery needed recharging. 

The new VIA PHD appliance, by comparison, 

could possibly run up to 20 hours 

utilizing the single charge of a car battery. 

The ultra-low power consumption 

of many of these Mini-ITX mainboards 

Figure 4 

Small-form-factor PCs 

Enter SFF PCs. Using small-form-factor, 

x86-based mainboards, vendors can 

easily create their own rugged and rural 

computer product, similar to existing 

devices such as the AMD PIC that overcome 

the technical challenges of deploying 

sustainable technology in emerging 

markets. A case in point is the VIA PHD 

appliance that Mumbai, India is currently 

developing and tailoring to deliver desktop 

performance utilizing a fanless, x86- 

based VIA processor in an embedded 

fanless design (Figure 5). 

Figure 5 

Most SFF PCs use Mini-ITX mainboards 

that enable desktop x86-style operation 

to a standard where surfing the Web, creating 

documents, and using video conferencing 

and VoIP is possible. With a 




Special 


enables operation with alternative energy 

sources and intermittent power supplies. 

Most VIA EPIA Mini-ITX mainboards, 

for example, draw between 25-35 W of 

power, or less than a quarter of what traditional 

desktop PCs consume. 

The ultra-compact form factor of Mini- 

ITX mainboards permits the transportation 

of up to six times as many SFF PCs 

for every equivalent desktop PC, reducing 

freight costs enormously and enabling the 

use of “traditional” modes of transport in 

remote areas. Mini-ITX enables the case 

itself to dissipate heat rather than internal 

fans, further reducing heat and dust. 

Using a case with heat fins, Mini-ITX 

mainboards enable designs that eliminate 

the need for cooling vents, thereby 

preventing dust and pollutant clogging, 

as well as static damage to internal components. 

A fanless heat fin design also 

reduces the internal system temperature 

and components’ vulnerability. 

When combined with the advantage of 

rapid time to market, SFF PCs empower 

developers and vendors to easily create 

customized, innovative solutions for 

emerging markets. With the many benefits 

that small-form-factor, x86 computing 

brings to the rural deployment table, 

the next four years should see some fantastic 

opportunities as emerging markets 

take off. 

Chris Bennetts 

is international 

marketing specialist 

– processor 

platforms at VIA. 

Previously, Chris 

worked at industrial 

mainboard manufacturer 

Expert Electronic Corporation 

in Taiwan as head of marketing and 

sales. Before that, in 2000, he started 

his own chain of computer retail stores 

called Dirkwoods Computer Upgraders, 

which he sold in 2004 before moving 

to Taiwan. Chris has a Bachelor of 

Commerce degree from Bond University, 

Australia. 

For more information, contact Chris at: 

VIA Technologies, Inc. 

8F, 531-533 Chung Cheng Rd. 

Hsin Tien, Taipei Taiwan 231 

Tel: +886-2-2218-5254, Ext. 6662 

E-mail: chrisbennetts@via.com.tw 

Website: www.via.com.tw 

www.opensystems-publishing.com/ecast.html 

Serial fabrics E-cast: 

MARCH 15, 2006 

VXS with RapidIO for SIGINT and 

radar deployments 

AdvancedTCA E-cast: 

MARCH 28, 2006 

Meeting carrier requirements with 

AdvancedTCA and AdvancedMCs 

Moderated by Joe Pavlat 

Ecast 


Product Guide: 


Company Name/ 

Model Number 

Description 

ARINC 

Avionics 

Industrial computers 

MIL-STD-1553 

Rugged/MIL-SPEC 

Telemetry 

4DSP 

38 / Spring 2006 PC/104 Embedded Solutions 

www.4dsp.com 

FM480 Virtex-4 PMC A PMC/PMC-X module for DSP applications with high bandwidth and complex algorithms • 

ACCES I/O Products 

www.accesio.com 

104-DIO-16 A low-cost, 32-channel, PC/104 utility board • 

Advanced Digital Logic 

www.adlogic-pc104.com 

MSMP3SEN/SEV A PC/104-based Pentium III/Celeron computer with a 300, 400, or 700 MHz smartCoreP3 CPU • 

MSMP5SEV/SEN/SN A 166 or 266 MHz Pentium III processor PC/104 module • 

MSM586SL A PC/104 module featuring soldered SDRAM to help withstand shock and vibration • 

MPC40 A fanless industrial PC for high-performance applications • 

MPC30 A family of small (159 mm x 245 mm x 66 mm) computers with several interfaces • 

MPCX47 A waterproof mini PC suitable for use in vehicle and military applications • • 

AIM-USA 

www.aim-online.com 

EasyLOAD-615A A software package for use with AIM’s AFDX/ARINC664 test and simulation interface modules • • 

Andor Design 

www.andordesign.com 

PCI301 A high-performance, low-cost dual redundant MIL-STD-1553 interface card • 

Applied Data Systems 

www.applieddata.net 

VGX A single board computer featuring an Intel 32-bit 400 MHz PXA255 (RISC-based) processor • 

Thin Client Building Blocks ARM RISC-based XScale single board computers • 

Arcom Control Systems 

www.arcom.com 

VIPER Embedded Linux Dev Kit A 2.4-based Linux kernel, GNU C library • 

VIPER Dev Kit for VxWorks A development kit for VxWorks 5.5 • 

W-E-B Telemetry An integrated cellular modem (GPRS or iDEN), GPS receiver, and power supply platform • 

Avalon 

www.avalondefense.com 

MIL-STD-1553 Card for PC/104 Single- and dual-channel MIL-STD-1553 PC/104 cards • 

Ballard Technology 

www.ballardtech.com 

PC1553-3x Dual-redundant MIL-STD-1553 interface boards for ISA (PC/AT compatible) computers • • 

BiTMICRO Networks 

www.bitmicro.com 

E-Disk FC Series A line of pure, solid-state, E-Disk flash disks based on the Fibre Channel interface • 

BMC Communications 

www.bmccorp.com 

PC104-UADI A PC/104 universal avionics digital interface • 

cPCI-UADI-1553-ARINC An SBC used to simulate, test, and act as an avionics communications interface • 

C 2 I 2 Systems 

MIL-STD-1553B Remote 

Terminal PMC 

Calmotion LLC 

A rugged MIL-STD-1553B conduction-cooled or air-cooled PMC adapter 

MC104p A Microchip PIC18F8722 40 MHz CPU • 

ChipX 

www.ccii.co.za 

• 

www.calmotion.com 

www.chipx.com 

CX Family Structured ASICs A complete line of structured ASICs for rugged applications • 

Condor Engineering 

www.condoreng.com 

CEI-830 A high-density ARINC 429 PMC module • • 

FlightCORE-1553 A MIL-STD-1553 library for Altera and Xilinx FPGAs • 

Connect Tech 

www.connecttech.com 

Xtreme/104-Plus A family of serial communications cards for embedded military and industrial applications • 

Data Device 

www.ddc-web.com 

RPC (SSPC Module) A remote, solid-state power controller board • 

Datametrics 

Tuff Rider Series Model 9300-EC A Pentium M SBC and display combination • 

Tuff Rider Series Model 9000 An SBC mounted in metal housing with up to 14 I/Os and 4 processor speeds • 

www.datametrics.com



Company Name/ 

Model Number 

Diamond Systems 

www.diamondsystems.com 

Mercury A PC/104-Plus expansion module with Ethernet and digital I/O • 

Athena A rugged embedded CPU featuring a VIA Eden Pentium III-class processor, 400-660 MHz • 

EMM-OPTO-XT A PC/104 form factor serial port module • 

DIGITAL-LOGIC AG 

www.digitallogic.com 

MSMP3SEN/SEV PC/104-based Pentium III/Celeron computer with a 300, 400, or 700 MHz smartCoreP3 CPU • 

MSMP5SEV/SEN/SN A 166 or 266 MHz Pentium III processor PC/104 module • 

MSM586SL A PC/104 module featuring soldered SDRAM to help withstand shock and vibration • 

MPC40 A fanless industrial PC for high-performance applications • 

MPC30 A family of small (159 mm x 245 mm x 66 mm) computers with several interfaces • 

MPCX47 A waterproof mini PC suitable for use in vehicle and military applications • • 

Diversified Technology 

TrexSys-4 4U PCI/ISA industrial rackmount system for surveillance and security • 

DSS Networks 

www.atcatogo.com 

www.dssnetworks.com 

Gig-PrPMC Module 7463 A PowerPC-based processor PMC • 

Dynamic Engineering 

Description 

PC104p-H009 A PC/104-Plus card that translates between the H009 bus protocol and the PCI bus • 

ARINC 

Avionics 


MIL-STD-1553 


Telemetry 

www.dyneng.com 

Continued on page 40 






Company Name/ 

Model Number 

Description 

ARINC 

Avionics 


MIL-STD-1553 


Telemetry 

Electrim 

www.electrim.com 

EDC-3000C/D Color (3000C) and monochrome (3000D) USB 2.0 scientific grade camera systems • 

Enseo 

Alchemy PC/104-Plus 

EuroTecH 

An OEM server designed for video-on-demand applications using MPEG audio/video and 

contained in installations sensitive to vibration and shock 

www.enseo.com 

• 

www.eurotech.it 

CPU-1450 A PC/104-Plus Celeron CPU module • 

COM-1250 A PC/104 MIL-STD-1553 interface module that operates at -40 ºC/+85 °C • 

ACS-5160 A PC104 MIL power supply module 60 W isolated • 

Excalibur Systems 

www.mil-1553.com 

PC104Plus/4000 A multiprotocol avionics communication board designed to the PC/104-Plus specification • • 

Fastwel 

www.fastwel.com 

CPC303 A PC/104 SBC featuring a Geode GX1/300 MHz with low-voltage core • 

GD California/Motorola 

MBX 860 A standard EBX form factor board • 

InHand Electronics 

www.gdca.com 

www.inhandelectronics.com 

Fingertip 3 An ultra low-powered handheld platform for military and commercial applications • 

Jita Enterprise 

855 Fanless Embedded 

Computer 

Kontron 

A compact, fanless embedded system with four serial ports and unique thermal design 

www.jitaent.com 

• 

www.kontron.com 

104-422/485-8 An eight-port PC/104 serial asynchronous adapter • 

LSI Logic 

www.lsilogic.com 

RapidChip Xtreme2 A high-performance, highly integrated serial interconnect platform ASIC family • 

RapidChip Integrator2 A cell-based platform ASIC solution • 

Megatel 

www.megatel.ca 

PCpi A rugged Pentium-class PC/104 SBC • 

PCpe A rugged, fully featured Pentium-class SBC • 

Micro/sys 

www.embeddedsys.com 

MPC624 A PC/104 expansion board • 

SBC2596 A Pentium EBX computer with data acquisition/GPS/CAN LP Pentium • 

SBC4495 An EPIC form factor SBC with GPS and data acquisition • 

SBC1625 An XScale PC/104 computer with dual Ethernet • 

SBC1495 A 486/586 PC/104 computer • 

Moxa Technologies 

www.moxaUSA.com 

UC-7420 An embedded RISC Linux communication computer • • 

MPL 

www.mpl.ch 

OCSI Board Family A family of Octal Serial Communication Interface (OSCI) PC/104-Plus modules • 

Octagon Systems 

www.octagonsystems.com 

2060 A rugged PC/104 SBC designed to operate from –40 °C to +85 °C • 

OS Embedder Kits Kits to simplify operating system implementation on Octagon’s ruggedized SBCs • 

Parvus 

www.parvus.com 

SpacePC 2200 An embedded PC/104 computer featuring an STPC 486DX processor at 75 MHz • 

AM-TFT LCDs Rugged 6.4” or 10.4” LCD displays • 

SpacePC 1451 A rugged PC/104-Plus SBC • 

USB104+ A four-port, high-speed USB 2.0 host controller with two high-current USB ports • 

Switch104 A rugged, five-port PC/104 10/100BASE-T Ethernet switching hub • 

1553 Bus Controllers Bus controllers featuring dual-redundant MIL-STD-1553 function (1553 A/B protocols) • 




Company Name/ 

Model Number 

Description 

ARINC 

Avionics 


MIL-STD-1553 


Telemetry 

Pentek 

www.pentek.com 

Model 7140 A dual digital up/downconverter PMC/XMC with FPGA • 

RTD 

www.rtdusa.com 

dspModules A line of DSP modules with 3.3 V or 5 V PCI interface • 

Sabritec 

ESD Filter Connectors 

SBS Technologies 

Composite filter connectors for circular, rack, and panel (ARINC), and D-sub miniature 

receptacles 

www.sabritec.com 

• 

www.sbs.com 

ABI-PC104-2 An extended temperature MIL-STD-1553 interface card for a PC/104 backplane • • 

ASF-PC104-2 A single-function, dual-channel MIL-STD-1553 PC/104 interface • 

SEAKR Engineering 

PCI Mezzanine Nonvolatile 

Memory Card 

Sealevel Systems 

A conduction-cooled 8 GB solid-state flash memory card designed for the military/aerospace 

industry 

www.seakr.com 

• 

www.sealevel.com 

SIO4-104 A family of four-port PC/104 serial I/O modules • 

Simon Industries 

www.simonindustries.com 

Conduction-cooled Heat Frames Conduction-cooled heat frames for circuit boards • 

Continued on page 42 






Company Name/ 

Model Number 

Description 

ARINC 

Avionics 


MIL-STD-1553 


Telemetry 

SMA 

www.SMAcomputers.com 

Enduro A fanless industrial computer specially designed for mobile equipment applications • 

Enduro VGA A ruggedized industrial computer with integrated graphics controller • 

Small PC Computers 

www.smallpc.com 

SC200 A Pentium or P3 CPU in a small, rugged package (10.6" x 2.4" x 6.4") • • 

Snijder 

SmartControl SC-21x An all-in-one HMI computer with integrated 5.7" color LCD and touch screen • 

Square One Industries 

www.snijder.com 

www.square1industries.com 

NC-679 A 3.5" embedded form factor SBC with VIA CPU • 

Stealth Computer Corporation 

www.stealthcomputer.com 

LPC-401FS A 1.5 GHz Celeron mobile fanless embedded small form factor PC • 

Tri-M Systems 

www.tri-m.com 

EXTRACT-104 A tool to separate PC/104 and PC/104-Plus modules from stack or test equipment • 

VersaLogic 

www.versalogic.com 

Jaguar PC/104-Plus SBC with Pentium III/Celeron processor, AGP video, and 10/100BASE-T Ethernet • 

Data was extracted from OSP’s online products database on Feb. 3, 2006 (http://pc104online.com/products/). Categories searched include Military/Aerospace, 

Industrial Computers, and Rugged/MIL-SPEC. Entries have been edited for publication, and OpenSystems Publishing is not responsible for errors or 

omissions. Vendors are encouraged to add their new products to our website at the referenced URL. 





Editor’s Choice Products 

Modem/Cell 

phone combo 

E911 is finally becoming a 

reality in cellular handsets, and 

location-based services such as 

Google Maps are showing the 

value of linking cell phone and 

GPS capabilities to consumers. That same added 

value can be brought to embedded systems using the OrbiTrak GSM from 

Parvus. The PC/104-based module includes a 12-channel GPS receiver 

along with a tri-band GSM cellular modem. 

Designed for embedded vehicle, shipboard, rail, and other mobile 

systems, the board includes a tri-band GSM/GPRS Siemens 

900/1800/1900 MHz MC45 modem with onboard or external SIM card 

interface. GPS capabilities come from a Fastrax iTrax02 12-channel, 

low-power receiver. Since the overall module most likely will be used in 

automotive applications, Parvus has included two automotive level 

digital inputs for 12 V or 24 V connectivity. Of these, one is connected 

to an odometer counter. There are also four RS-232 serial ports and 

16 programmable digital I/O lines. 

Parvus Corporation 

www.parvus.com 

RSC #21168 

Lockdown disk drives 

Even though solid-state 

media such as CompactFlash 

or solid-state disk drives are 

commonplace in small-formfactor 

embedded systems, newer and larger formats such as EPIC and 

Mini-ITX may rely on rotating magnetic disks. Often based upon 2.5" 

IDE notebook computer drives, sensitive data can sometimes fall into the 

wrong hands. To protect the data in these embedded systems, full-disk 

encryption software can be highly effective. 

WinMagic’s SecureDoc software is designed to encrypt an entire 

disk while employing secure user authentication during a computer’s 

pre-boot sequence. This pre-boot authentication is unique and can 

utilize multi-factor authentication such as a combination of password, 

hardware token (such as a USB or other key), biometrics (such as a 

fingerprint reader), and Public Key Infrastructure (PKI). Although not 

necessary, when combined with silicon hardware capabilities such as 

Trusted Platform Computing, an embedded system’s sensitive data is 

securely locked down and encrypted. SecureDoc is bundled in Toshiba 

notebooks sold in Japan. 

WinMagic 

www.winmagic.com 

RSC #29706 

Two-in-one SBC with 

four-channel data 

acquisition 

Sure, you could add a data acquisition 

module plugged onto your PC/104 single 

board computer. But with the Elektra SBC 

from Diamond Systems, if you need full 

features and A/D capability, this base card may meet your 

needs. Running a 200 MHz Pentium II class CPU with 128 MB of memory, 

10/100BASE-T Ethernet, and the full complement of PC peripherals, this 

SBC is ideal for one-board data acquisition systems. Did we also mention 

that it will operate within a –40 °C to +85 °C temperature range? 

Elektra draws only 5.5 W and is ideal for fanless and rugged installations. 

Beyond the I/O mentioned above, there are also four RS-232 ports, two 

USB 1.1 ports, and a watchdog timer and battery backup for the RTCC. 

But the A/D and D/A capabilities are the real story here. There are 

16 analog inputs into a MUX feeding an error-free 100 KHz 16-bit A/D 

converter. There are also four 12-bit D/A channels and 24 programmable 

digital I/O lines. Built-in auto calibration circuitry provides enhanced 

accuracy for analog measurements. 

Diamond Systems Corporation 

www.diamondsystems.com 

RSC #23532 

RoHS-compliant 

Geode SBC 

A newcomer to these pages, 

Evalue has packed a 3.5" single 

board computer with loads 

of PC-like features while still 

offering expansion connectivity 

to PCI-104 boards. Based upon a 333 MHz AMD 

Geode GX2 GX466 processor that sips a mere 0.9 W, 

Evalue claims this CPU uses 50 percent less power than any comparable 

x86 processor on the market. The ECM-3512 is designed for fanless 

operation in kiosks, POS terminals, test systems, and other passively 

cooled applications. 

Interfaces include dual 10/100BASE-T Ethernet, onboard support for 

24-bit LCD screens (including TFT and LVDS), and two-channel AC97 audio. 

There are two serial ports, a 16-bit digital I/O port, four USB 1.1 ports, 

and two Ultra DMA 100 IDE interfaces for disk access. For solid-state local 

storage, there’s a Type I/II CompactFlash socket. Finally, the board is 

RoHS compliant. 

Evalue 

www.evalue-tech.com 

RSC #29705 


Modular digital o-scope 

instruments 

Designing small form factor systems is more than just identifying 

functionality in an SBC and selecting a vendor. You’re building 

a system, so there’s software to write, interfaces to verify, 

and sensors to wire. With small-form-factor systems that are 

deploying in heaven-knows-where locations, stationary bench 

testers are being replaced by portable and deployable modular 

instruments such as the ZT410 family from ZTEC. Available in 

PXI, PCI, and VXI flavors, as well as 14- and 16-bit versions, 

these digital oscilloscopes combine benchtop features with 

high-precision measurement capability. Low noise, distortion, 

and drift – combined with a wide dynamic range – are 

characteristics all instruments require. 

Available in two base versions, the ZT410-20 has a 14-bit 

resolution and captures data at 500 MSps with a maximum 

bandwidth of 250 MHz. The module accommodates two 

channels and is, of course, software compatible. The ZT410-50 

offers 16-bit resolution at 400 MSps at a maximum bandwidth 

of 250 MHz. It also has two channels and is software 

compatible. Features include flexible signal conditioning, 

advanced triggering, auto-config and setup, as well as 

onboard signal processing. 

ZTEC Instruments 

www.ztec-inc.com 

RSC #25179 

Not just 

another lizard: 

A changing Gecko 

And you thought only a chameleon 

could change. VersaLogic’s EPIC-2e 

“Gecko” board is now qualified 

for extended temperature 

operation from –40 °C to +85 °C so it’s ideal 

for harsh environments and deeply embedded applications. 

Based upon the EPIC form factor, this single board computer uses an AMD 

GX-500 CPU with an equivalent 500 MHz operation while only consuming 1.5 W. This 

means fanless and more robust operation. Up to 512 MB of DDR SDRAM feeds the processor. 

More importantly, EPIC modules accommodate PC/104 and PC/104-Plus boards as mezzanines, 

offering a wealth of additional processor and I/O capabilities. Not to be outdone, the Gecko also 

includes integrated video with analog and LVDS, 10/100BASE-T Ethernet, analog and digital I/O, four 

USB and four COM ports, LPT, IDE, a CompactFlash socket, and stereo sound. For added peace of mind, 

there’s a watchdog timer, self-resetting I/O fuses, and transient voltage suppression (TVS) devices for 

ESD protection. 

VersaLogic Corporation 

www.versalogic.com 

RSC #20940 



46 / Spring 2006 PC/104 Embedded Solutions 


By Sharon Schnakenburg 

Bridge: Other 

Future Technology Devices International 

RSC 24910 

Website: www.ftdichip.com 

Model: FT232R RSC No: 24910 

A USB-UART bridge with MCU clock generator and 

FTDIChip-ID security dongle • Onboard EEPROM, 

master clock generator, 3.3v LDO regulator, reset 

generator, and USB termination resistors • Full 

modem control handshake signals • Five generalpurpose 

I/O pins • Royalty-free device drivers for 

Windows, CE, Linux, and MAC-OS • SSOP-28 and 

miniature QFN-32 5 mm x 5 mm package options 

• Parallel FIFO (FT245R) version also available 

RSC 24852 

controller, a 600 MHz DSP, and Virtex-II Pro • 

Works in an array of modules as a slave or host 

• Can run standalone and use the on-module flash 

for booting and control of the disk array • Module 

with SATA disk interface from the DSP 

NewProducts 

Mezzanine: CCPMC 

4DSP 

A PC/104, one to four axes DC/BLDC/microstepping/ 

stepper motion controller • Available in one-, two-, 

three-, and four-axes versions • Single axis with 

51.2 µs, four axes versions with 256 µs servo loop 

update rates • Motion profiles include S-curve, 

trapezoidal, velocity contouring, external profile, 

and electronic gearing • Advanced PID filter 

with velocity and acceleration feed forward, bias 

offset, and 32-bit position error • Parallel, CAN 

2.0B, and serial (RS-232/point-to-point/multi-drop) 

communications interface • Choice of 32 KB dual 

port or 512 KB single port RAM supporting trace 

capabilities • 256 16-bit word I/0 locations for userdefined 

peripherals 

Video: Display 

Micro/sys 

I/O: Digital 

ACCES I/O Products, Inc. 

RSC 24932 

Website: www.accesio.com 

Model: USB-IIRO-16 RSC No: 24932 

USB 16-channel optically isolated input and 16 

electromechanical relay output module • Highspeed 

USB 2.0 device, USB 1.1 compatible • 16 

optically isolated inputs • 16 Form C electromechanical 

relays switch up to 1 A each • Internal, 

removable screw terminal board for easy wiring 

• Small (4" x 4" x 1.25") rugged industrial enclosure 

• Custom high-speed function driver • OEM (board 

only) version with PC/104 mounting holes and 

PCB footprint for added flexibility in embedded 

applications 

Mass storage: Solid state disk 

Sundance 

Website: www.sundance.com 

Model: SMT387 RSC No: 24852 

Integrated DSP, memory, flash, and storage solution 

• Includes the latest generation Serial ATA 

RSC 24817 

Website: www.4dsp.com 

Model: FM480 Virtex-4 PMC RSC No: 24817 

Virtex-4 PMC with QDR2 SRAM and DDR2 SDRAM 

memory resources and front panel I/O • Xilinx 

Virtex-4 FPGA XC4SX55, XC4LX80, XC4LX100, or 

XC4LX160 • XC2VP7 with embedded PowerPC 

processor • Two DDR2 SDRAM devices (256 

MB), four QDR2 SRAM devices (32 MB), 256 Mb 

flash device • PCI-X 64-bit 133 MHz, PCI 64-bit 66/ 

33 MHz • Front panel I/O daughtercard for LVDS, 

GbE, FPDP, video inputs and outputs, A/D, D/A, 

DDR2 SDRAM 

Motion control 

servo-Halbeck GmbH & Co.KG 

Website: www.servo-halbeck.com 

Model: POSYS 1800 RSC No: 24922 

RSC 24922 

RSC 24275 

Website: www.embeddedsys.com 

Model: SBC1670 RSC No: 24275 

XScale PC/104 computer with LCD panel support 

• 520 MHz low-power ARM processor • 800 x 600 

color LCD interface • 10/100BASE-T Ethernet • 

Onboard I/O includes USB and CompactFlash 

• Up to 64 MB onboard linear flash • 128 MB of 

SDRAM • Five serial ports • LCD interface supports 

STN, DSTN, and TFT panels up to 800 x 600 

pixels • Debounced keypad interface • Extended 

temperature option available • Linux and Windows 

CE compatible 

For more information, 

visit our website: 

www.pc104online.com/products 

Then select 

Advanced PC/104 Product Search. 

Once you arrive at the 

search page, enter the 

RSC number in the 

field provided. 


OpenSystems 

Publishing OpenSystems Publishing 

Spring 2006 


A D V E R T I S E R I N F O R M A T I O N 

Page/RSC# 

Advertiser/Product description 

34 ACCES I/O Products – Analog, Digital, Relay, and Serial I/O 

46 Advantech – PCI-104 Pentium M Solutions 

52 Ampro Computers – Embedded Motherboards 

4101 Aprotek – PC/104 Hard Disk Module 

51 Arcom Control Systems – VULCAN Single Board Computer 

15 Calmotion LLC – Digital DC Drive 

24 Dataforth Corporation – SensorLex 8B 

2 Diamond Systems – PC/104 Board Stack and Enclosure 

29 DIGITAL-LOGIC AG – MSM915 

35 Embedded Planet – Customized Solutions 

13 Excalibur Systems – Avionics Communications 

4102 ICP America – GoPC-Mobile 

49 Jacyl – Digital FPGA and Analog FPAA 

6 kontron – Custom Embedded Solutions 

22 LiPPERT Automationstechnik – PCI-104 Module 

5 Micro/sys – SBC1586, SBC1495, SBC2590 

7 Microbus – Elcard Wireless LAN Modules 

3901 MPL – MPL Peripheral Family 

4201 MPL – IPC Family 

31 Radian Heatsink – Standard and Custom Heatsinks 

3902 Radicom – PC/104 Modem 

1901 RAF Electronic Hardware – RAF Electronic Hardware 

26 RTD – PC/PCI-104 Modules and Systems 

43 RTS Embedded World – Embedded World Conference 2006 

4202 Scidyne – PC/104 Peripherals 

36 Servo Halbeck – Posys Motion Controllers 

21 Sundance – SMT287 



37 Technologic – 200 MHz CPU 

9 toronto MicroElectronics – DVR301 

33 Toronto MicroElectronics – PC/104 - P3 

1902 Toronto MicroElectronics – PC/104 and PC/104-Plus 

Peripherals 

18 Tri-M Systems – Flash Solutions 

45 Tri-M Systems – V5SC 

14 VersaLogic – EBX, PC/104, EPIC 

11 WDL Systems – Engineering Tools 

3 WinSystems – Wired and Wireless Modular PC/104 

Modules 

Advertising/Business Office 

30233 Jefferson Avenue 

St. Clair Shores, MI 48082 

Tel: 586-415-6500 n Fax: 586-415-4882 

Vice President Marketing & Sales 

Patrick Hopper 

phopper@opensystems-publishing.com 

Business Manager 

Karen Layman 

Communications Group 

Patrick Hopper 

Vice President Marketing & Sales 

phopper@opensystems-publishing.com 

Christine Long 

Print and Online Marketing Specialist 

clong@opensystems-publishing.com 

Embedded and Test & Analysis Group 

Dennis Doyle 

Senior Account Manager 

ddoyle@opensystems-publishing.com 

Doug Cordier 

Account Manager 

dcordier@opensystems-publishing.com 

Military & Aerospace Group 

Tom Varcie 

Account Manager 

tvarcie@opensystems-publishing.com 

Andrea Stabile 

Advertising/Marketing Coordinator 

astabile@opensystems-publishing.com 

International Sales 

Stefan Baginski 

European Bureau Chief 

sbaginski@opensystems-publishing.com 

Reprints and PDFs 

Call the sales office: 586-415-6500 

www.compactpci-systems.com/rsc 



Insight 

PC/104 and others: The fork in the road 

between desktops and embedded 


I first learned about PC/104 sometime around 1994. Back then 

my world was 6U and larger cards stuffed into boxes the size of 

foot lockers. I found it incredibly cool that a desktop PC could be 

built by stacking together a bunch of tiny PCBs like big Legos. 

Not only that, this PC/104 “personal computer” thing could also 

add additional and custom I/O. At that time, I was working for 

a military integrator and the prospect of adding I/O modules for 

MIL-STD-1553, ARINC-429, and weapons stores to a cube-like 

PC/104 stack was very compelling. It still is. 

If you check out this month’s product guide on rugged, industrial, 

and MIL-SPEC products (page 38), you’ll see that all kinds of 

small form factors target non-benign applications. Increasingly, 

I’m seeing PC/104 and other Computer-On-Module/System-On- 

Module (COM/SOM) products geared towards what are certainly 

not desktop PC applications. Yet, PC/104 and many of the other 

flavors we cover in PC/104 Embedded Solutions magazine have 

their origins in the desktop space. 

It’s the rugged markets that are impaling PC/104 and other small 

form factors squarely at the fork in the road between tomorrow’s 

desktop functionality and the more specialized applicationspecific 

variants. Which way will the industry go? 

Playing it “PC” 

On one path is the desktop market, which has been mostly stagnant 

for the last couple of years in terms of technology and 

unit growth. That’ll change soon. Since module standards such 

as PC/104, EPIC, ETX, Mini-ITX, and others have their roots 

in the PC space, there will soon be pressure to adopt a whole 

truckload of new “desktop” multimedia features, software, and 

inter-networking pipes. 

Pentium M-based single board computers are now showing up 

in our PC/104 database. It wasn’t long ago that standards such 

as PC/104 only offered x86 processors such as AMD’s Geode, 

VIA’s Eden, or other variants. Why? Intel’s Pentium 4 and Pentium 

4m CPUs burned too much heat that couldn’t be dissipated 

on smaller boards. When Intel introduced the Centrino series of 

Pentium M, Ultra Low Voltage (ULV) Pentium Ms, chipsets, 

and wireless devices, suddenly the newer 30 W+ devices were 

“feasible” on smaller modules again. 

From the desktop, laptop, and metropolitan space also comes 

wireless connectivity, first with IEEE 802.11b, then a, g, “pre-n,” 

and soon “n” and 802.16 WiMAX flavors. It’s alphabet soup, but 

consumers now demand wireless connectivity in laptops, PDAs, 

and game consoles. Users can add Wi-Fi SDIO cards to all kinds 

of battery-operated doodads, and the home entertainment PC 

concept seeks to connect all kinds of wired and portable devices 

into a computer-based home network. In addition, the equipment 

need not be limited to a traditional PC, as set-top boxes, 

video recorders, and now Intel processor-based iMacs get into 

the game. These devices are all fundamentally based upon PC 

processors, peripherals (think USB 2.0), and memory such as 

flash-based thumb drives. 

A lot of this embedded interconnectivity is going to find its 

way onto traditional PC/104 and other small form factor modules, 

as is the software, be it Microsoft’s Vista, Intel’s Viiv API, 

Apple’s OS X (or “OSx86”), or a Linux distribution. Check out 

what VIA is doing with some of their new Mini-ITX modules 

on page 32. 

Embedded or not 

On the other path are those rugged applications that demand 

performance in a small space, low power dissipation, fanless 

operation, and custom I/O. Companies such as motor controller 

expert Calmotion (page 20) have married PC/104’s size with 

programmable microcontrollers to realize cost-effective heavy 

industry motor controls. 

Non-benign applications may shy away from the latest consumer 

whiz-bang hardware such as AMD Athlon64 processors, not 

because they can’t be practically cooled – don’t even think of it 

on a PC/104 board – but because long life and backwards compatibility 

with 32- or even 16-bit code (think 80186) is imperative. 

And while Asynchronous JavaScript and XML (AJAX) may 

finally replace the security nightmare of ActiveX in desktops, 

rugged embedded modules may run code and security features 

in the Nucleus RTOS from Accelerated Technology. For PC-like 

functionality, Microsoft’s updated Windows XP Embedded 

distribution will remain a better choice than XP. 

Stuck in the middle with you 

Which way will PC/104 and other small form factors go? Will 

they follow their roots and consciously trail behind tomorrow’s 

connected multimedia desktop, or will they continue to take 

market share in rugged apps from CompactPCI, VME, and mezzanines 

like PMC? One thing’s for certain: It’ll be interesting to 

watch over the next 12-18 months. 

Drop me a line with any comments or questions; I’d like to hear 

from you. 

Chris A. Ciufo 

Group Editorial Director 

PC/104 Embedded Solutions magazine 

www.pc104online.com 

cciufo@opensystems-publishing.com 


RSC# 51 @ www.pc104online.com/rsc

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