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Contents Viewpoint On-demand Embedded Cloud Computing Services

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Cover Story SUSIAccess - Smart Access to Embedded Devices

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Vertical Application Success with SUSIAccess Higher Device Availability for Factory Automation

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Efficient Network Management for Digital Signage

10

Making Remote Management Possible for ATM Applications

12

System Health Monitoring for COM Applications

14

Cover Story

Technology Forum Embracing the New Generation Intel Atom Family with DDR3 Memory Support

SUSIAccess Smart Access to Embedded Devices 16

Published by

Advantech Co., Ltd.

Publisher

Superior Performance with 2nd Gen Intel® Core™ i7 Processors

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Transforming the World of COM Express - Specification 2.0

24

Miller Chang

Address

No.1, Alley 20, Lane 26, Rueiguang Road, Neihu District, Taipei, Taiwan 114 Tel +886-2-2792-7818 Website www.advantech.com/Embcore

Editorial Supervisor Embedded Core Group

Product In-Depth

Editorial Committee

New Products

28

2011 Star Product Selection Guide

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Macro Chen Aaron Su Sandy Chen Vincent Chen Victor Huang CL Chiang Chiwen.Lin Ethan Chen Tones Yen Tawei Wang Samantha Chiang Mandy Chen Irene Chang Sandy Chang Martin Marshall Miles Odonnol Richard Ponce

Emb’Core is published for ADVANTECH Co., Ltd. by Interculture Custom Media. All rights reserved.

Reproduction without permission is strictly prohibited.

Please verify specifications before quoting. This guide is intended for reference purposes only.

All product specifications are subject to change without notice.

No part of this publication may be reproduced in any form or by any means, electronic, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior written permission of the publisher.

All brand and product names are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective companies. © Advantech Co., Ltd. 2010

View Point

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View Point

View Point

On-demand Embedded Cloud Computing Services A

new analysis report from IDC indicates that “cloud computing will still be an important driving force for businessa investment in 2011, and the deployment of private cloud computing centers in enterprises will raise the demand for automated management applications and system integration services”. It also means that as businesses establish their own cloud computing services, there will be a variety of terminal equipment and devices that will adopt embedded systems to connect to the cloud architecture. Therefore, managing and monitoring all the software and hardware in these embedded platforms, as well as maintaining their security, will be a major issue. As a comprehensive embedded platform provider, Advantech first put forward their own embedded cloud services with the SaaS (Software as a Service) service model, and with the launches of the Embedded Store website and SUSIAccess API suite for customers. Advantech’s Embedded Store can provide the latest embedded hardware drivers and updated software. When all the various embedded devices are networked, they will link to the Embedded Store website to automatically search for online software updates and latest data.

This intelligent tool makes management more simple and efficient. SUSIAccess is another innovative service that gives customers a convenient interface with which to remotely monitor, configure, and manage a large number of terminal equipment and devices, as well as the ability to recover a system if it halts or crashes.

Advantech will gradually implement and integrate these embedded cloud services starting from the Embedded Store website. This cloud computing software platform will contain many built-in software APIs, tools, and utilities including: Device Drivers, SUSIAccess, Vertical Apps, BIOS & Firmware, Platform Utilities, and some 3rd party applications, as well as details of Advantech’s products in 2011. If there are drivers or firmware that has to be updated, the system will actively remind users to connect to the cloud server, so there will be no need to browse, search, and download data from Advantech’s website. In the second stage, Advantech will include more products such as COM, ESBC, IMB, Embedded BOX IPC, IPC, and iServer to develop the services in the cloud. The final step is to expand and target Advantech’s services to the vertical industries

including digital signage, vehicle computers, game machines, POS / KIOSK, medical, and IoT. Furthermore, Advantech will also release the APIs on the Embedded Store site, so that system integrators will be able to design their own custom cloud services.

The cover story for this issue of Embcore Journal will detail the functions and applications of SUSIAccess.

Advantech launched their original eSOS security tool in 2009, and SUSIAccess is the latest software tool for intelligent remote management which will be launched in Q2 2011. To face increasing competition, Advantech’s value-added software tools provide convenience and cost saving efficiencies to users.

In the era of cloud computing, we need more intelligent and secure embedded platforms. Advantech offers two innovative services to simplify embedded device management and maintenance for system developers and users. Through the cloud, they can fully understand the condition of each device, and the active update functions can offer the best stability and efficiency for a system. This will represent a huge change to the present operation of embedded devices. Advantech’s software services will step from behind the scenes and lead the IPC industry into a new era of embedded services in the cloud.

Miller Chang

Advantech Embedded Core Group Associate Vice President

View Point

3

Cover Story

SUSIAccess - Smart Access to Embedded Devices

By CL Chiang, Manager, Advantech

D

esigning embedded systems with dedicated functions and tasks requires unique solutions and specifications that demand high standards of service in order to deliver a seamless experience to users in a diverse range of industries. Faced with increasing competition, vendors have always strived to add more value to their products. This is where Advantech’s SUSIAccess software comes in.

Advantech has been developing the SUSI API series since 2004 to create convenient management solutions for embedded applications. After the original security features of eSOS (a small embedded OS used to boot up a system when the major OS boot-up fails) were introduced in 2009, Advantech launched SUSIAccess in Q2 2011, incorporating the latest cloud computing concepts. Nowadays, because most embedded devices are connected, the System Integrator can employ remote access solutions to manage or rescue their remote embedded devices. This new version enables users to remotely control, configure and manage, multiple terminal devices and data, as well as providing system maintenance, backup and recovery.

The new smart remote access solution for embedded devices will give customers more control over their devices regardless of the hardware platform specifications.

Proactive data gathering reduces maintenance cost, improves efficiency and reduces down time The main purpose of SUSI (Secure & Unified Smart Interface) was to provide a set of tools to effortlessly monitor and integrate the system through an intelligent interface as well as helping to save power and energy. By adopting Advantech’s SUSIAccess, any unique combination of software and hardware 4

Cover Story

can achieve maximum efficiency for end users’ applications.

“SUSIAccess was derived from Advantech’s ePlatforms to monitor and manage multiple terminal devices as well as configure, maintain and recover them.

Cover Story SUSIAccess centralizes monitoring of all embedded devices; it collects all device data, and provides logs in a customized dashboard or table view. When errors occur, it auto-notifies the system administrator via warning popups and e-mail alerts. And if there’s a major system crash, it automatically reboots so it can run diagnostics and deploy system recovery procedures. If necessary, it can deploy firmware upgrades or file updates, and it can even capture screens to help troubleshoot problems.

The main difference between SUSIAccess and other competitive products are the proactive data mining features.

SUSIAccess not only actively detects embedded devices, but also saves related data on the server for subsequent evaluation. Backup or recovery can be performed with the help of the eSOS utility. An emergency OS image is stored in an FTP server or on a hidden partition to provide ultimate peace of mind. SUSIAccess can enable remote recovery by manually clicking the restore button to recover the whole system. These remote operations can significantly reduce the maintenance and manpower costs arising from on-site visits.

More cost-effective troubleshooting using remote access and control Take digital signage for example, there are hundreds or even thousands of units in a typical airport or in chain stores up and down the country. To be able to effectively control all those devices and quickly resolve any problems is a big challenge, and although there are similar products that provide early warning functions, it is not so simple to determine what causes a system to fail. Usually, maintenance staff will need to inspect a broken product to determine what the problem is.

the remote management features of SUSIAccess. With SUSIAccess, when a device fails or behaves abnormally, the system will send a message so that a user can remotely diagnose and resolve problems. Most problems can be resolved by remote control which can drastically reduce maintenance effort.

Furthermore, some digital signage devices may have been installed high up, or placed in difficult to get at locations— making regular backups or updates difficult to perform. But, through the remote configuration and system backup features of SUSIAccess, users can backup any system or update data from the convenience of the central administration office.

Devices can also have volumes and displays adjusted through SUSIAccess.

Future versions will combine Intel technology SUSIAccess features are also suitable for many different application fields such as traffic monitoring, logistics and transportation, factory automation or ATM management. The greatest value of Advantech’s SUSIAccess is that it provides a ready to use remote access solution for system integrators to monitor, control, recover and manage their embedded devices from anywhere. Hitches and glitches are taken out of complex projects, and developers can concentrate on adding value to their application and reaching the market ahead of the competition. SUSIAccess is included with selected Advantech embedded products. SUSIAccess will continue to evolve with new functions to fulfill customer requirements as the need arises, and in order to add more value and provide the best services, Advantech will launch SUSIAccess 2.0 specifically for Intel technology in the second half of 2011.

Obviously, staff on-site visits can be an unnecessary waste of time and manpower. Such scenarios can be resolved by using

Cover Story

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Cover Story

SUSIAccess Core features ■ Centralized Device Monitoring ■ Collects all embedded device data ■ Displays data in a customized dashboard ■ Auto notifies errors via warning popups and

e-mail

alerts

Monitors all device status information including: temperature, voltage, fan speed, and peripherals like SQFlash SSD, 3.5G strength, and remaining battery power—information that is essential for reliable administration of the embedded system. Log data is recorded for every event and stored in a SQL DB. ■ Configuration

■ Integrated Remote Control ■ Remotely adjust embedded device settings ■ Transfer files to a remote device for firmware

or application updates ■ Remote diagnostics via screen captures, hardware log analysis, and windows XP event log files

■ One-Click System Recovery ■ Back-up complete system and files any time ■ Restore a system ■ Smart back-up saves images to offsite FTP

SUSIAccess Benefits ■ Lowers complexity for embedded system deployment ■ Saves time and resources during system builds ■ Increases system reliability ■ All devices have real-time monitoring ■ Instantly control devices to resolve technical issues ■ Recover the OS image if Windows XP crashes ■ Transfer files to remote devices for firmware or

application updates ■ Decrease after-service costs ■ Reduced volume and customer

call duration, more issues solved via SUSIAccess ■ Reduced service visits, more issues solved remotely ■ Reduced cost of visits—correct parts are sourced for FAE engineers

Nowadays, because all embedded devices are connected together, an administrator can use SUSIAccess to remotely configure all their embedded devices from one location.

Configuration options include high and low warning tolerances for all values such as system temperature, fan speeds, and voltages, as well as values for displays, and additional functions for screen captures, as well as FTP file transfer for firmware or application updates.

■ Recovery

SUSIAccess Functions ■ Monitoring

System Recovery is a system backup/restore utility. An emergency OS image is stored in an FTP server or hidden partition to provide ultimate peace of mind. When an embedded OS fails to boot up properly or if for whatever reason a system crashes, SUSIAccess can enable remote recovery by manually clicking a restore button to recover the whole system. System administrators can also remotely set monitoring criteria for warning popups and e-mail notifications.

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Cover Story

Cover Story

SUSIAccess Software Structure SUSIAccess includes three parts: Console, Server and Client. Below is the communication structure.

■ SUSIAccess

Console The main user-interface, which is used for monitoring, managing, and controlling the client side of Windows XP, and other configuration settings.

■ SUSIAccess

Server The main program that synchronizes data with all clients—a service program that auto runs after windows boots up.

■ SUSIAccess

Client The client side program that synchronizes data with SUSI Access Server. This is a service program that auto runs after Windows boots up. eSOS is a small embedded OS, designed by Advantech, and used to boot up the system when the major OS boot up fails. eSOS is installed in a hidden partition area of storage.

Advantech’s SUSIAccess provides a ready to use remote access application for System Integrators to monitor, control, recover and manage their embedded devices from anywhere.

With SUSIAccess, hitches and glitches are taken out of complex projects, and developers can concentrate on adding value to their application and reaching the market ahead of the competition. SUSIAccess is included with selected Advantech embedded products. SUSIAccess will continue to evolve with new functions to fulfill customer requirements and simplify application development. * SUSIAccess v1.0 supports embedded OS like Windows XP Professional and Windows XP Embedded. Other OS will be supported in the near future.

Cover Story

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Story Success with SUSIAccess Vertical Cover Application

Higher Device Availability for Factory Automation SUSIAccess remote monitoring for device maintenance and configuration

By Brian She, Product Manager, Advantech

The Challenge Fully automated industrial control systems are everywhere in today’s large factories. All production line equipment is controlled by computers to achieve higher productivity and efficiency as well as helping reduce human errors. Break downs and problems with control systems can cause large-scale production line shutdowns, thereby affecting overall production capacity and output. Therefore, it’s vital to keep shutdowns to minimum, but deploying the right solution can be complicated.

A business needs to employ a large human resource to conduct routine inspection checks and make sure that all devices are functioning continuously under normal conditions. Due to the large scale of equipment used in factories, it is not always easy to identify problems quickly. Often a problem is 8

Cover Story

only discovered after a system has been shut down, and this interrupts production lines, which in turn costs money. So if potential problems can be discovered early, maintenance personnel and repair equipment can be quickly deployed, saving time and money.

Cover Story

The Solution Steady and uninterrupted service has always been the aim of industrial automation applications, whilst also being able to endure a variety of harsh environments. FAE engineers responsible for maintenance in the field need experience and practical know how to properly look after equipment. If a system shows abnormal states, and preventive measures are not taken, problems can quite easily escalate and cause equipment damage. But, if an effective and flexible control system can be employed for monitoring plant and equipment in factories, it can reduce the overall maintenance workload, reduce labor costs and improve safety.

In the past, it required a lot of time and manpower to develop system monitoring software for such applications, even if the supplier provided ready-made software or APIs (e.g.

Advantech SUSI or iManager). It still needed huge resources to develop an application in-house, or involved huge cost

to buy it from other software vendors; especially if remote monitoring and central control needed to be integrated at the same time. Plus, additional considerations in the overall cost were impacted by support, maintenance and upgrades.

SUSIAccess was our response. It not only retained the flexible features and ease of use from Advantech’s previous SUSI API software suites, but also integrated a remote central monitoring function that allows IT developers to easily implement monitoring functions suitable for all kinds of applications and environments at a very small cost. Through the SUSIAccess console, system operators can implement several of the API functions that give full remote control and access to their applications. It is also possible through mobile devices like smart phones, to see if there are any system abnormalities, and if problems are detected, take preventive measures before things get too serious.

Machine A Remote Console 3.5" SBC Machine B Internet/ VPN 3.5" SBC Machine C

SUSIAccess Server

3.5" SBC

How SUSIAccess Helps SUSIAccess also supports the integration of API for external devices and monitoring systems in order to perform simultaneous monitoring with the main system. This greatly increases flexibility, and links with various types of external sensors to further achieve full “situational awareness” of a device instead of being just “system-aware”.

Hardware is not the only consideration when looking for an industrial automation solution. How to develop software services and programs that reduce labor costs, plus integrating resources are important considerations when deciding which vendor provides the best offering. By incorporating Advantech’s SUSIAccess, IT developers and system integrators can quickly develop cost-efficient and reliable solutions more quickly.

Cover Story

9

Story Success with SUSIAccess Vertical Cover Application

Efficient Network Management for Digital Signage

SUSIAccess remote management software simplifies network maintenance and reduces the need for costly on-site support

By Monica Sun, Product Sales Manager, Advantech

The Challenge Flight information display systems (FIDS) are widely adopted by airports and train stations around the world; not only to show arrival and departure times but also real-time information about delays, weather, safety information, as well as entertainment and advertising content. These next-generation displays can reduce the workload for staff members (fewer inquiries and schedule updates), and also cut down on the perceived waiting times for passengers. Advertising time is sold to marketers who want to reach airport travelers, and Advantech digital signage platforms provide the perfect media player and display engine behind the screens. Of course, sometimes it’s unavoidable that occasionally FIDS run into technical problems and need quick on-site support to fix the problem. The typical airport FIDS is a large deployment with more than 100 screens and needs to be carefully managed. This is where SUSIAccess comes in.

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Cover Story

Cover Story

The Solution As most airports close around midnight, on-site support can only be arranged during night time and work needs to be finished as quickly as possible before the earliest flights depart a few hours later. Most system operators have to employ (or outsource) several engineers and pay costly overtime fees; all of which adds to the total cost of ownership. And because many remote management software applications offered by signage software houses cannot guarantee compatibility between software functions and hardware platforms, system managers often need to consult technical

Remote Console

Internet/ VPN

SUSIAccess Server

support teams from both software and hardware vendors to resolve problems. To overcome these kinds of scenarios, Advantech developed SUSIAccess as a value-added remote monitoring and configuration application on top of our media player platform. With SUSIAccess, compatibility is assured, and there is a single point of contact for technical support.

Furthermore, because most media players are likely to be installed close by, either behind an LCD display or above a ceiling, SUSIAccess will also make maintenance easier through remote management functions.

Digital Signage Platform

Digital Signage Platform

Digital Signage Platform

LCD

Video Wall

Projector

How SUSIAccess Helps ■ Remote

Control

then reboot a media player remotely from the SUSIAccess console, reset all settings, and restore the system.

From an energy saving point of view, the media player can be setup to automatically turn off during the night. In fact, most operators would rather keep the platform running as this is the ideal time to upload content or software revisions.

With SUSIAccess, it is easy to setup daily maintenance schedules which turn the player off during certain times and back on when they want. The on/off function can be implemented even if the power button on the media player was switched off previously.

■ Proof-of-play

In the “Monitoring” section of SUSIAccess, the FIDS network administrator can dynamically track the status of each media player as an individual device.

If the device is inactive and not communicating with the server, operators can use the “Get Screen” function to capture the screen and check if it’s crashed or hung-up. They can

The “Get Screen” function was implemented to facilitate trouble shooting by remotely capturing display screens.

With this next generation version of SUSIAccess, users can set the frequency of “Get Screen” captures so that screens are captured automatically at user-defined intervals which are very useful for problem diagnosis. This is also important in advertising when an advert is shown as part of the multimedia content and “proof of play” is one of the key metrics for any return on investment evaluation.

Cover Story

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Story Success with SUSIAccess Vertical Cover Application

Making Remote Management Possible for ATM Applications SUSIAccess remote restores a system back online with just a click

By Vincent Chen, Senior Manager, Advantech

The Challenge Advantech Industrial Motherboards (AIMB) are used by many KIOSK applications around the world, especially in the field of multi-location ATM applications. Simultaneously, remotely, and centrally managing a bank’s ATM network normally equates to time savings and cost reductions. This is simply because they require much fewer field technicians to physically reach every single ATM for either on-site diagnosis and/or re-programming.

The Solution Advantech SUSIAccess is a Windows XP-based (Linux in later versions) application, it is an ideal software solution which enables ATM operators to not only monitor (Device Monitoring function) each individual ATM system at the same time from a centralized remote site, but also take control of client ATMs by changing system setting and updating firmware (Device Configuration). In addition, when an ATM error occurs, a system can automatically diagnose itself and send a warning message to an operator. Such messages will be shown on an icon-interfaced control panel which can help operators to immediately identify the problem and its exact location. Even with such remote capabilities, some problems can’t be resolved, but it still helps operators decide whether to dispatch technicians with appropriate tools for on-site maintenance, rather than traveling blind and finding they still need to go back to HQ for replacements.

12

Cover Story

Cover Story In addition to remote monitoring and management, one of the major advantages of SUSIAccess is to make system recovery from remote sites possible. All bank managers understand the serious impact if ATM operating systems crash or stop working properly. Downtime critically affects a bank’s revenue, customer service, and brand image. With SUSIAccess installed, just select that particular ATM icon and choose the One-Click-Recovery button on the user-

friendly control panel. SUSIAccess will then start to re-boot the system through its special eSOS tool which recovers the system by using a pre-installed emergency OS hidden in the partition of the client ATM. Once the ATM has been successfully re-started, SUSIAccess will then continue to restore and recover all necessary system files and data, enabling the ATM to operate normally again.

Area A Remote Console Internet/ VPN

Mini-ITX Motherboard Area B

SUSIAccess Server Mini-ITX Motherboard

How SUSIAccess Helps jumping between Intel, AMD, or any other 3rd party x86 platforms. Another reason for ATM system designers to choose SUSIAccess as part of their entire ATM management program is that Advantech can not only provide a complete software package, it can also address other security concerns within their ATM network.

The three major software components of SUSIAccess are as follows, ■ SUSIAccess

Console: User (ATM operators) interface for client ATM monitoring, control & setting, and recovery

■ SUSIAccess

Server: A sever-based program which synchronizes data with client ATMs

■ SUSIAccess

Why choose SUSIAccess when there might be similar remote-access management solutions on the market?

One of the benefits of SUSIAccess is that it is hardware independent. These days there are more and more ATMs which perform as multi-functional terminals offering video advertising, lottery gaming, and many other applications.

Hardware platforms within ATMs are very diverse nowadays.

Since SUSIAccess is a software application based upon Advantech’s existing SUSI API tools and utilities, it can work under most hardware environments without major modification. This makes it easier for any hardware to meet its performance requirements, but also provides flexibility when ATM hardware upgrades are required.

In such scenarios, SUSIAccess is a smart choice without

Client: A client-side program which communicates and synchronizes data with SUSIAccess Server

Now it’s easier than ever to take full advantage of SUSIAccess (combining Device Monitoring, Device Configuration, and One-Click-Recovery), which leverage the power of the Internet to provide an ideal solution for ATM operation and management. These powerful tools can help banks to attract more customers by improving their customer service, minimizing downtime, enhancing ATM management.

Cover Story

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Story Success with SUSIAccess Vertical Cover Application

System Health Monitoring for COM Applications SUSIAccess system health monitoring reduces maintenance times, and prevents system malfunctions in advance

By Chesung Liu, Application Engineer, Advantech

The Challenge Most large metropolitan cities rely on integrated public transportation systems like buses, subways or railways to move people efficiently around. Transportation systems need to reliably run 24/7 no matter if it’s sunny, snowing or raining.

Weather and harsh environments cause systems to slowly wear and deteriorate, and system malfunctions are unavoidable, but continuous system monitoring and maintenance can make systems operate longer and run more safely and reliably.

Subway systems and tunnels can typically span hundreds of kilometers, so if one part malfunctions, it can be very difficult to diagnose the source of a problem. Without proper monitoring, control centers are powerless, and if problems occur during rush hours, it could be chaotic and dangerous.

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Cover Story

The Solution To overcome this, Advantech developed SUSIAccess.

SUSIAccess is an integrated API utility suite that provides system control, monitoring and recovery functions. It can be a stand-alone utility or communicate between systems becoming a network information utility. Most transportation applications are highly integrated and complex, making it very difficult to analyze potential problems without detailed

feedback information. Design Engineers are always looking for more efficient ways to remotely control and monitor their systems, and this is where SUSIAccess comes in. SUSIAccess can provide in-depth monitoring of circuit voltage levels, temperatures, as well as the status and reports of all devices and components in the system. It can even determine wireless transmission strengths.

COM-Express Basic Module

Storage Module

Station A Remote Console

Storage Module

COM-Express Basic Module

Internet/ VPN/Wireless WAN/LAN

Station B GPS Module

SUSIAccess Server

COM-Express Basic Module

Station C

How SUSIAccess Helps â– CF

card life cycle monitoring Most subway systems are designed to monitor and record the whole system 24/7 and transmit all that information to the control center. If an unfortunate accident happens, management will then have all the relevant data on hand to analyze and remedy the problem. These systems need massive storage capacities to fulfill the huge data requirements. However, it is a fact of life that storage devices occasionally go bad during read and write phases, and writing errors or complete crashes happen from time to time. So far, there are no 100% reliable long life storage solutions for transportation. Traditional storage devices like HDD have natural limitations especially when operating in harsh environments with high vibration or high temperatures. Solid state storage devices like CF cards or SD cards are more suitable to operate in harsh environments, but they have finite read/write times and life spans. Frequently changing and updating storage devices are critical to balance system reliability and cost. One of the outstanding features of SUSIAccess is that it is able to see the status of all peripheral devices.

Currently SUSIAccess provides CF card usage status and functions like S.M.A.R.T information, which shows wear levels and life cycles. With this feature, management can easily schedule maintenance or send out technicians to check a system.

â– Wireless

Signal Strength monitoring Another special feature is that SUSIAccess has the ability to monitor wireless signal strengths. Reliable wireless communications are essential in modern transit systems, and clear communication relies on solid signal strength, but many factors can affect their quality especially in concrete underground tunnels. Monitoring signal quality and dynamically adjusting signal output strength can secure data integrity. With SUSIAccess, the control center manager is able to monitor wireless strength and even improve the communication quality in dead spots so that important data never gets lost.

Cover Story

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Technology Forum

Embracing the New Generation Intel Atom Family with DDR3 Memory Support

By Victor Huang, Product Manager, Advantech

A

dvantech recently launched eight new products based on the latest Intel Atom N410/ D510 processors released in 2010.

The new processors gained many project wins due to their low power and exceptional performance, which are suitable for a wide range of applications. The new processors replace the Intel Atom N410/D510 solutions which only supported DDR2 memory. DDR3 memory has become mainstream now and has higher speeds, 30% less power consumption, lower cost, better supply lead times, as well as larger memory capacities than DDR2 memory.

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Technology Forum

Technology Forum

First Atom Processor with DDR3 Support The latest Intel Atom N455 processor single core and D525 dual core processors both support DDR3 memory up to 2 GB for N455, and up to 4 GB for D525. With integrated graphics and memory controllers, these processors deliver graphics core rendering speeds from 200 to 400 MHz while maintaining excellent power efficiency.

hardware decoding. They also support Intel® streaming SIMD Extensions (SSE) 2 and Intel® SSE3, enabling software to accelerate data processing in specific areas, such as complex arithmetic and video decoding. The Intel Atom N455/D525 processors run at 1.66/1.8 GHz with single channel DDR3 at 800MHz, and TDP of 9W for N455 and 13W for D525.

The new Intel Atom platforms are empowered by enhanced Intel SpeedStep and C-states, and dynamic L2 cache sizing technology, which enables much better power savings while providing top performance and rich I/O capability—meaning the new platform can do more with less power. The graphics support Intel Gen 3.5 DX9, DirectX 9.0c, and MPEG2

The new platforms include the Intel® 82801HM ICH8M I/O controller that provides a high definition audio interface and rich I/O capabilities via multiple high bandwidth interfaces such as PCI Express, PCI, Serial ATA, and Hi-Speed USB 2.0.

Intel Atom Processor D510

Intel Atom Processor N450

Intel Atom Processor D525

Intel Atom Processor N455

Cores

2

1

2

1

CPU Frequency

1.66Ghz/667

1.66Ghz/667

1.8Ghz/800

1.66Ghz/667

Memory Frequency

DDR2 667

DDR2 667

DDR3 800

DDR3 800

CPU Cache

2 x 512kB L2

512kB L2

2 x 512kB L2

512kB L2

Power States

C0 to C1 (POR)

C0 to C4 (POR)

C0 to C1 (POR)

C0 to C4 (POR)

Graphics

Gen3.5 DX9, 400MHz

Gen3.5 DX9, 200MHz

Gen3.5 DX9, 400MHz

Gen3.5 DX9, 200MHz

VGA: 2048 x 1536 max

VGA: 1400 x 1050

VGA: 2048 x 1536 max

VGA: 1400 x 1050

Max Resolution

LVDS: 1366 x 768; WXGA: 1280 x 800 max

LVDS: 1366 x 768; WXGA: 1280 x 800 max

Memory

Single Ch, 2 SoDIMM per ch, DDR2

Single Ch, 2 SoDIMM per ch, DDR3

Max Memory

2 GB

4 GB

Display I/F

Dual Display VGA and LVDS

Dual Display VGA and LVDS

KIT TDP

16W

16W

*T support

HT, EM64T, XD

IO Hub

ICH8M

8W

2 GB 9W

Table 1. Comparison with Intel Atom D510/N450 and D525/N425

Table 2. Performance benchmark with Intel Atom D510/N450 and D525/N425 Technology Forum

17

Technology Forum

Full Spectrum of Atom Platforms Providing targeted performance for a wide variety of embedded application projects, Advantech has implemented the Intel Atom N455 single core and D525 dual core, and the ICH8M chipset into various embedded form factors and systems ranging from computer on modules, PC/104, 3.5” SBC, half-size SBC, and mini-ITX, to fanless embedded IPC. These combinations provide a superb balance of performance versus power, they are ideal for applications where small size, low power consumption, and thermal efficiency are crucial.

Not only do a wide range of products benefit from the Atom N455/D525 platform itself, but they are also incorporated with Advantech’s add-on value hardware and software design.

For example, stackable single board computer products such as PCM-9363 (3.5” SBC) and PCM-3363 (PCI-104), which feature 24-bit LVDS, are developed by Advantech from older 18-bit LVDS originating from Intel Atom N455/D525 processors, helping to make them compatible with many common LCD panels. PCM-9363 also supports HDMI display resolutions up to 1080p to fulfill demands for large monitor displays with HDMI interface. PCM-9363 supports a DC power hot-plug protection design to prevent board damage from direct DC power which can cause unstable voltages

to pulse through and damage the board. To be much more reliable and endure extreme environments, Advantech’s PCM-9363/3363 are designed with 15KV air protection ESD COM Port Driver IC, 100% solid capacitors with better MTBF compared with electrolytic capacitors, and a TG-150 PCB type that allows the PCB to endure higher temperatures.

To fulfill rugged application demands, Advantech’s PCM3363 supports DDR3 on board memory with lockable box wafer connecter for anti-vibration. PCM-3363 also has an enhanced reliable hardware design to guarantee 100% bootups, even when enduring low temperatures for extended periods of time, even down to -40° C. It also ensures that abnormal transient power fluctuations won’t cause a system to freeze, making it suitable for un-manned and outdoor applications which occasionally experience unstable mains power.

Advantech not only provides a comprehensive range of Atombased embedded boards, but also multi OS support, including Windows 7, XPe, WinCE, QNX, and Linux. Plus, a variety of intelligent software API’s are bundled with Advantech Atombased boards to facilitate application development.

PCM-3363 PCI-104 Modules with Ruggedized Design Low Power ■ Intel Atom N455 SC 1.66 GHz, Fanless, 9W ■ Intel Atom DC D525 1.8 GHz, 16W

Extreme Cold Start Guaranteed

Rugged Adaptation ■ Supports extended temperatures -40~85°C ■ HALT (Highly Accelerated Life Testing) applied

Anti-Vibration ■ Onboard memory 512MB/1GB ■ 100% locked connector

Reliability Enhanced Extreme cold start guaranteed and voltage dip protection

Software Compatible Complete Windows Embedded OS support: CE, XPE, WES, WES7

Compact Standard PCI-104 96 x 90mm dimensions

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Technology Forum

Model Name

SOM-7562 B1

PCM-3363

PCM-9363

AIMB-213

PCA-6782

ARK-1503

Form Factor

COM-Ultra

PCI-104

3.5” SBC

Mini-ITX

Haf-size SBC

Embedded BOX IPC

Processor

Intel Atom N455

Intel Atom N455/D525

Intel Atom N455/D525

Intel Atom N455/D525

Intel Atom N455/D525

Intel Atom D425/ D525

Memory

On-board DDR3 1GB

On-board DDR3 1GB

DDR3 SO-DIMM up to 4GB

DDR3 SO-DIMM up to 4GB

DDR2 SO-DIMM up to 2GB

DDR3 SO-DIMM up to 4GB

Display Output

VGA/18-bit LVDS

VGA/24-bit LVDS

VGA/24-bit LVDS/HDMI

VGA/24-bit LVDS/DVI

VGA/18-bit LVDS

VGA/ 24-bit LVDS

IO Type

COM-Express

USB, SATA, COM GPIO, CF, SMBUS, HD audio

USB, SATA, COM GPIO, CF, SMBUS,I2C, HD audio, miniPCIe

USB, SATA, COM GPIO, CF, HD audio

USB, SATA, COM GPIO, CF, 8bit GPIO, PS/2, FDD

USB, COM, CF, LAN, mini-PCIe, DIO

Dimensions

84 x 55 mm (3.3”x2.17”)

96 x 90 mm (3.8”x3.5”)

146 x 102 mm (5.7”x 4”)

170 mm x 170 mm (6.69” x 6.69”)

185 mm x 122 mm (7.3” x 4.8”)

230.6 x 133.0 x 44.4 mm

•Supports TPM(optional) for security application •Supports Mini-PCIe for wireless module •Supports VGA/24-bit LVDS/DVI display output

•Ultra low power, fan-less N455 CPU and max. 2 GB DDR2 667 memory (Only for N SKU) •Dual core high performance D525 CPU and maximum 2 GB DDR2 667 memory (Only for D SKU) •VGA/LVDS dual video outputs •Optional module for 4 x RS-485 w/ auto-flow control

•Built-in 1 x PCIe expansion slot for communication modules, like WLAN •Supports external CF socket •Supports 2.5” SATA HDD and easy to maintain •Integrated LVDS interface for panel display

•POS/KIOSK •Gaming

• CNC machines •Factory automation

•Embedded Control System •Factory/Machine control •KIOSK

Special Features

Target Market

•Built-in Advantech iManager •Supports extended temperatures -40~85°C

•Portable Device Application •Medical applications •Robust applications.

•15KV COM ESD protection driver IC design •Locked box wafer conncetor •100% boot up in cold start •Endurance in unstable power, power on -off in a transient period (mSec) •Designed with 100% Solid Capacitors

•Multiple display: 18/24bit LVDS, VGA or HDMI •PWM and linear panel backlight control •15KV COM ESD protection driver IC design •12V DC power and DC power hot plug protection design •Designed with 100% Solid Capacitors

• Medical applications • Outdoor application • CNC machines • Transportation • Military

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Technology Forum

Superior Performance with 2nd Gen Intel® Core™ i7 Processors

By James Wang, Product Manager, Advantech

I

ntel, the worldwide leading vendor of embedded chip solutions, has just announced the introduction of its 2nd generation Core™ i7 processor (code named Sandy Bridge) plus its corresponding peripheral I/O chipset (code named Cougar Point). For signage, gaming, and imaging applications, the processing and graphics performance of the latest i7, combined with flexible I/O, will satisfy many designers’ requirements and provide end-users with a richer experience. For Industrialautomation systems, it is common to interact with multiple generations of technologies like low speed RS-232 and high speed Gigabit LAN. Sandy Bridge’s latest Dynamic Turbo Boost technology can balance the requirements of performance and power consumption. Based on these advantages, it’s worth taking a look into what benefits and state-of-the-art technologies we can expect from Intel.

New CPU Micro Architecture The latest Sandy Bridge processors represent the “tock” in Intel’s “tick-tock” development roadmap, they are a major refinement of their CPU micro architecture on 32nm technology. Sandy Bridge processors bring extraordinary performance growth and lower power consumption over last year’s Core i3, i5 and i7 chips and feature nearly a billion transistors in each chip. The new 256-bit instruction set of Intel’s called Advance Vector Extension (AVX) provides almost double floating point computing capacity which benefits 3D 20

Technology Forum

gaming, scientific and medical image processing, digital signage, and other applications that need a large amount of signal processing. Also, new control algorithms for the CPU and graphics improve energy management to allow short bursts of power greater than TDP for more performance, another significant upgrade to their Turbo Boost technology. It also is a first platform that has a Quad Core CPU implemented on a BGA that meets deep embedded requirements for a more reliable solution with very high stability.

Technology Forum

Figure 1. Dynamic Turbo Boost

Integrated Graphics Core on 32 nm Process Intel Sandy Bridge processor integrates a powerful graphics core into a monolithic 32nm process die and brings better performance with more efficiency. With up to 2x improvement in 3D graphics performance over previous generation Westmere, this is a competitive entry level solution. There are significantly improved graphics over the previous generation with Direct X10.1 & OpenGL 3.0 which will improve gaming realism, and hardware acceleration is supported on both decode and encode cycles making transcoding between different video formats much easier.

Figure 2. New Hardware Encode function for Transcoding

Enhanced Display Intel Sandy Bridge contains a dedicated embedded Display Port (eDP) on the CPU which enables newer switchable graphics models. Switchable Graphics is a function that switches display control to the integrated graphics chipset controller for longer battery usage, and switches to discrete graphics control for performance while using external AC power. Using the dedicated eDP port can lower platform average power about 200-300mW, lower BOM cost on connectors, cabling, and filters, and reduce EMI due to data scrambling and embedded clock errors. A wide range of display interfaces like VGA, LVDS, SDVO, HDMI, DVI, DP and eDP are supported, with additional features like dual HDMI/DP with HDCP and independent premium audio.

Figure 3. Switchable Graphics

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PCI Express Gen2 5 GT/s Support For functional extension to PCI Express, Sandy Bridge supports PCI Express Gen2 5 GT/s that offers double speed from the previous generation. More integrated controllers (4 for PGA and workstation skus and 3 for others) can support various configurations if customers need to connect to multiple devices which process higher bandwidths.

Figure 4. Sandy Bridge PCIe Configure Variations

New Features for Platform Controller Hub The new Cougar Point Platform Controller Hub (PCH) comes in a smaller package, has less pin count, but still has richer and more advanced features that improve flexibility and data throughput.

SATA Gen3 and Intel RST 10.0 Supported Cougar Point supports up to six SATA ports, including 2 x Gen 3 ports which double the Gen 2 interface rate up to 6 Gb/s (600MB/s). In addition to these SATA ports, the latest Intel Rapid Storage Technology 10.0 (Intel RST 10.0) provides improved power management capabilities to allow the interface to be powered down during idle periods while providing very fast recovery times.

Integrated Clock Generator Full clock integration in Cougar Point not only reduces BOM costs since eliminating CK505 and its peripheral components, but also takes advantage of PCB space saving, and enables aggressive power management by the chipset to allow different PLLs and clock dividers to be statically shut down to save power.

Intel AMT 7.0 With backward compatibility to run AMT 6.0 on new platforms, AMT 7.0 improves on host based provisioning and local host configuration. Host based provisioning allows an easy way to activate AMT parameters for clients. Local host configuration introduces a new concept that partitions Intel AMT functions into realms and interfaces and allows management configuration local setting at activated AMT PCs. Feature

Intel Ibex Peak (Q57/HM55)

Intel Cougar Point (QM67/HM65)

Package Size

25 x 27 mm, 1071 balls

25 x 25 mm, 989 balls

PCI-Express

Gen 2 (2.5GT/s)

Gen 2 (5 GT/s)

SATA

6 SATA 3 Gb/s Ports

2 SATA 6 Gb/s Ports 4 SATA 3 Gb/s Ports

Clocking

CK505

Full Clock Integrated

PCI

4 ports

No PCI supported (External Bridge available)

Manageability Intel AMT 6.0

Intel AMT 7.0

PAVP

PAVP 2.0

PAVP 1.5

Table 1. I/O Function Comparison from New to Previous

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Advantech Solutions As a premier member of the Intel® Embedded Alliance, Advantech works in parallel developing embedded solutions in various form factors to provide our partners with cutting edge technologies that save development effort while achieving the highest performance.

Based on the Intel Core i7 processor and Intel® QM67 chipset, Advantech is releasing a COM-Express Basic module—SOM5890 (95 x125 mm), that is compliant with the newly released PICMG COM.0 R2.0 type 6 specification. With extraordinary processor performance, SOM-5890 supports DDR3 memory up to 1333 MB/s with ECC/non-ECC versions, SATA Gen3 (6Gb/s), PCI Express Gen2 (5Gb/s), and integrated HDMI/ DVI/DisplayPort display interfaces that use independent pins other than PEG ports. With great performance and rich graphic interface, it is suitable for high processing demands, graphic intensive tasks, and multi-display applications.

Utilizing the Intel Core i7 processor and Intel® Q67 chipset, Advantech developed a new series of embedded platforms in various form factors that include: Industrial Motherboards, PICMG 1.3 SHB, and ATX based server-grade motherboards.

Advantech’s MicroATX motherboard—AIMB-581 (244 x 244 mm), ATX motherboard—AIMB-781 (304.8 x 244 mm), and the PICMG 1.3 SBC—PCE-5126 (338.58 x 126.39 mm) feature

intelligent performance, power efficiency, and integrated Intel HD graphics with DX10.1 support. All of these products provide superb all-round performance, expandability, and versatility for media-demanding applications. ASMB-220 is a sub-entry UP industrial server board targeting industrial control, automation equipment and surveillance DVR applications.

Advantech will also be introducing a new industrial motherboard called AIMB-272, capable of SATA RAID 0, 1, 5 & 10 to ensure reliable storage and system protection for network-intensive applications, which brings top performance with power saving to the Mini-ITX motherboard class. To meet the rising demand for embedded solutions, especially in signage, kiosks, image processing, and gaming applications, Advantech dedicated resources to research, develop, and provide embedded solutions using state-of-theart technologies that our customers can adopt and apply in a rapidly changing world. Intel Sandy Bridge incorporates all the properties and functions needed for today’s embedded applications; it combines excellent computing and graphics performance with maximum I/O flexibility, and helps our customers to keep ahead of a fast changing game.

Coming Soon

Model Name

SOM-5890

AIMB-272

AIMB-581

AIMB-781

PCE-5126

ASMB-781

Form Factor

COM-Express R2.0, Type 6

Mini-ITX

MicroATX

ATX

PICMG 1.3 SHB

ATX

Dimension

95 x 125 mm

170 x 170 mm

244 x 244 mm

304.8 x 244 mm

338.58 x 126.39 mm 304.8 x 244 mm

Processor

Intel Core i7/ i5

Intel Core i7/ i5/i3

Intel Core i7/ i5/i3

Intel Core i7/ i5/i3

Intel Core i7/i5/i3

Intel Core i3

Chipset

QM67

QM67

Q67

Q67/B65

Q67/B65

-

Memory

Dual Channel up to 16GB

Dual Channel up to 8GB

Dual Channel up to 16GB

Dual Channel up to 16GB

Dual Channel up to 8GB

Dual Channel up to 32GB

PCI-Express Gen2 (5 GT/s), SATA Gen3 (6Gb/s) USB 3.0, PECI 3.0, Intel AMT 7.0, Intel vPro

PCI-Express Gen2 (5 GT/s) SATA Gen3 (6Gb/s) Intel AMT 7.0 Intel vPro PECI 3.0 TPM 1.2 (optional)

PCI-Express Gen2 (5 GT/s) SATA Gen3 (6Gb/s) Intel AMT 7.0 Intel PCEI 3.0 TPM 1.2 (optional)

IPMI ECC/Non-ECC DDR3 memory 2 x PCIe x16 expansion slot SATA Gen3 (6Gb/s) Intel AMT 7.0 Intel PCEI 3.0 TPM 1.2 (optional)

MA, Medical, Digital Surveillance, DVR

MA, Medical, Digital Surveillance, DVR

MA, Medical, Digital Surveillance

Special Features

PCI-Express Gen2 (5 GT/s), SATA Gen3 (6Gb/s) HDMI/DVI/DP Interface, Advantech iManager 2.0

PCI-Express Gen2 (5 GT/s), SATA Gen3 (6Gb/s) PECI 3.0, CFast, Intel AMT 7.0, Intel vPro

Target Marketing

Medical, Gaming, Digital Signage

Medical, Gaming, Medical, Digital Signage, Gaming, Digital Military Survillance

Advantech Intel Sandy Bridge Series-Based Solutions Technology Forum

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Technology Forum

Transforming the World of COM Express - Specification 2.0

By Carsten Rebmann, Technical Advisor, Advantech

T

he PICMG consortium released the COM.0 Rev.2.0 specification on August 30th 2010 to the public. With the release of this new version of the specification, the world of Computer On Module based solutions is changing and adapting to new technologies again. This article will introduce the major changes and the resulting effects to carrier board design.

The COM Express standard is the only COM standard maintained from an independent committee (PICMG) in the market.

With the new specification, the standard is adapting to new technologies and markets. But this also means that a deeper knowledge of the specification is necessary to choose the correct COM solution in the future and to avoid mistakes. The major changes are sorted into: mechanical, interface, and software features.

Mechanical Add-ons COM.0 Rev 2.0 includes one additional board form factor of 95mm x 95mm. This size is referred to as “Compact” size. In total three board form factors are now officially supported for the COM Express module design.

■ COM Express Extended Module: 155mm x 110mm ■ COM Express Basic Module: 125mm x 95mm ■ COM Express Compact Module: 95mm x 95mm ■ COM-Ultra Module: 84mm x 55mm

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Technology Forum

Technology Forum Even though the Compact Module size is already known in the market it is now also officially supported in the standard specification. The Compact Module form factor allows designs with up to 2 B2B connectors thus all existing pin out definitions can be realized on the module.

The module height including the heat spreader is on all three versions defined with 18mm for the 5mm B2B headers. With 8mm headers the total height reaches 21mm.

Changes in Detail: ■ Audio:

In addition to the already supported AC97 audio interface COM module vendors can chose to support HDA instead.

The pins for it are shared so that either AC97 or HDA is supported. This change is related to all pin out types.

■ TV-out:

The TV out function is removed from the pin out definitions.

Customers that need the function have to include additional circuitry on their carrier board designs.

■ USB-Client:

•Standoffs are threaded (M2.5) or clear (2.7mm) •Thickness ‘T’ is implementation specific and may be 5mm.

•Height ‘H’ (which includes PCB thickness) shall be 18.00 mm

Despite the existence of modules with the size of 84mm x 55mm (COM ultra), this module dimension is not yet included into the official standard and therefore different solutions with similar board dimensions are available in the market.

Thus the credit card sized 84mm x 55mm is supported from the majority of vendors that produce modules smaller than the Compact Module form factor allows.

Interface Changes The world of existing defined pin out versions was already complex with the first release of the COM.0 spec. The maze of choices and possibilities is now even more diverse and this has led to increased time and effort spent consulting in order to successfully complete projects for customers.

Existing Pin-out Definitions A total of 5 pin out definitions had been defined in the COM.0 specification version 1.0. These 5 pin out versions are redefined on some portions now, so that it is important to know for which specification the COM module and the carrier board was designed for. It is possible to make sure that the COM modules and carrier boards are able to work with both types of the specification. However, additional effort is needed to compensate for this compatibility issue.

Since most modules in the market follow type 2 pin outs we will highlight the changes between the COM.0 specification versions in this example: Row

A-B

I/O Function

COM.0 R1.0 Type2

COM.0 R2.0 Type2

Audio

AC97

AC97 or HDA

TV-out

1

N/A

USB Client

N/A

1

SPI

N/A

1

Power pins

21

12

Since many x86 platforms (especially Intel ATOM) support a USB client natively, the new pin out definition supports the possibility to utilize this feature in the future without proprietary vendor solutions or additional effort for customers on the carrier board.

■ SPI

interface: The SPI interface is now transferred to the board headers for customer usage. This allows the customer to add their own BIOS chip to the carrier board and to flash their own specific BIOS to it during the manufacturing process. Thus allowing the use of standard part number COM modules from vendors. In addition, customer settings in the BIOS will stay on the carrier board even when the COM module is exchanged. However the customer needs to know which COM board will be used on the carrier board. Plugging in a wrong module will result in bootup failures.

■ Power

pins: The new features mentioned above utilize pins that had been originally used for power pins. Therefore the pin count for power connections has now been reduced. This results in a lower maximum power consumption from the original 188W to 137W (Type 2,3,4,5,6 Modules).

Since all the changes for the type 2 pin outs are on rows A/B these changes also apply to the type 1 pin out definitions that are used for modules in the not yet standardized size of 84mm x 55mm (COM ultra). The maximum power consumption of modules of this form factor is now also reduced from the original 120W to 68W (Type 1, 10 Modules) from the standard. But this limitation will not affect any design since the board space allows only the low power ATOM platforms that don´t exceed power consumption of about 10W maximum.

New Pin-out Definitions In addition to the already existing pin out definitions (Type 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5), two new pin outs (Type 6 and 10) are defined in COM.0 version 2.

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25

Technology Forum ■ USB

Type 6 The type 6 pin out is based on two B2B connectors (rows A/B and C/D). In comparison to the type 2 pin out that represent the most common pin out of the past, the type 6 pin out removes legacy interfaces such as PCI, and IDE in order to provide new and future interface trends such as additional PCIe lanes and USB 3.0 links. The following table provides a comparison of the changes between the type 2 and the type 6 pin out definitions both from the COM.0 specification version 2.0.

Row

A-B

C-D

I/O Function

R2.0 Type 2

R2.0 Type 6

TV-out Serial Port USB Client SPI SDIO Fan Control Power pin DDI USB3.0 PCIex1 Port PCI IDE

N/A (Only in R1.0) N/A 1 (N/A in R1.0) 1 N/A N/A 12 (21 in R1.0) N/A N/A N/A 1 1

N/A 2 1 1 1 1 12 3 4 2 N/A N/A

Changes in Detail:

3.0 interface: The new pin out defines up to four USB 3.0 interfaces for future platforms. The new USB interface allows communications with up to 5Gbit/s. Allowing faster transfer rates for modern SSD drives and other communication intensive devices in the future. Also the carrier board design needs to address the new interface type since it allows devices to utilize up to 900mA / 5V from the port.

■ PCIe

x1 ports: Two additional PCIexpress x1 ports can be supported from the COM Express module compared to the type 2 standard.

■ Removed

features: In order to provide the connections for the above mentioned interfaces, the PCI and the IDE interfaces are removed.

Type 10 The type 10 pin out is defined with only one B2B connector (rows A/B) and is therefore only interesting for COM modules based on the not yet standardized COM ultra form factor. The table below provides an overview of the changes between the type 1 and the type 10 pin out specification: Row I/O Function

■ Serial

port: Up to two asynchronous serial ports (TTL compatible) can be provided from the module.

■ SDIO

interface: In case the processor platform provides an SDIO interface, the type 6 pin out allows the customer to utilize this interface in the future without additional cost overheads.

■ Fan

control: A PWM signal together with a tachometer input pin is defined in the new specification.

■ Power

pins The new pin count for the power allows modules with a maximum power consumption of 137W.

■ DDI

interface: Up to three DDI (Digital Display Interface) can be present on the type 6 pin out. This provides the flexibility for future multi display capabilities of modern x86 platforms.

The DDI interface can be utilized with DisplayPort, HDMI/ DVI and SDVO (DDI link 1 only). It will depend on the platform and the vendor which link will provide what standard. Therefore some attention should be spent during the definition of a carrier board design in order to find the right setup.

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A-B

VGA TV-out PCIex1 Port LVDS Channel DDI SATA Serial Port USB Client SPI SDIO Sleep/LID Input Fan Control Power pin

R2.0 Type 1

R2.0 Type 10

1 N/A (Only in R1.0) 6 2 N/A 4 N/A 1 (N/A in R1.0) 1 (N/A in R1.0) N/A N/A N/A 12 (21 in R1.0)

N/A N/A 4 1 1 2 2 1 1 1 1 1 12

New: Software Standardization – EAPI All COM solutions in the past suffered from the same problems on the software side. The hardware is standardized and ideally exchangeable but embedded solutions also need special features such as temperature monitoring, fan controls or many other features. Therefore, COM product vendors not only supported the customers with hardware, most also included software library functions. A customer had either the choice to limit themselves to a single vendor or they develop mechanisms to detect which vendor is present and enable the software to decide which API library to use.

This meant doubling the effort on software development.

Technology Forum By including the EAPI (Embedded API) specification to the new release of COM.0 Rev2.0 specification a major new step has been taken. For the first time also some software parts are unified so that customers can setup their applications independent from the vendor they chose.

At present the following functions are defined in the EAPI specification release 1.0: ■ System Information The current supported system information are: ■ Vendor ID ■ HW ID & SW versions ■ Boot counter and board uptime ■ HW temperatures, voltages and fan status.

■ Watchdog

timer A normal watchdog function is present. In addition vendors can program a staged watchdog timer function. In this case an initial event is triggered first from the watchdog. Only if there is no reaction within a predefined time after the first trigger event a reset will be issued from the watchdog.

This allows to program recovery mechanisms to prevent a failing system from rebooting. An end user might only see a dead system and after a short period it acts normal again. Instead of seeing the reboot directly.

■ I2C

bus The current specification defines 3 I2C busses for COM Express modules. One is defined for the baseboard interface.

The other two are used for display interfaces. Since additional

COM-Ultra

COM-Express Compact

vendor or platform specific interface might exist, customers need to take special care about this feature.

■ Flat

Panel brightness controls The backlight status (On/Off) and additional parameters for the backlights like the backlight brightness can be influenced.

■ User

storage area The EAPI defines a user storage area with at least 32 Bytes in order to store additional customer specific IDs.

■ GPIO

By default the EAPI supports 4 general purpose inputs and 4 general purpose outputs. Depending on the vendor implementation and the platform different configurations might be present.

Summary: The new specification COM.0 release 2.0 provides multiple new features and opportunities. With the EAPI implementation the COM market really evolves one step further. On the other hand, the COM express standard is getting even more complex and additional care needs to be taken for the design specification and implementation to profit from the added functionality without running into compatibility issues. A strong COM module partner with design assistant services can help to bridge this gap and help to optimize better carrier board solutions.

COM-Express Compact

COM-Express Basic

Development Board SOM-DB5800

SOM-7564

SOM-6764

SOM-6763 B1

SOM-5890

COM 2.0 Type 10

COM 2.0 Type 2

COM 2.0 Type 2

COM 2.0 Type 6

COM 2.0

••Intel® Atom™ E6xx series up to 1.6GHz ••1 GB DDR2 on-board memory ••PCIe x1, PCI, SATA, EIDE, 6 USB ••Operating temperature: -40 ~ 85° C

••Intel® Atom™ N455/D525 processor + ICH8M ••24-bit LVDS, VGA ••2-ch. DDR3-667/800 SODIMM sockets up to 2 GB ••5 PCIe x1, 4 PCI masters, 3 SATA II, 8 USB 2.0, EIDE, GbE

••Intel® Core™ i7/i5/i3 processor + QM67 ••2-ch. 18/24-bit LVDS, HDMI, DisplayPort, VGA ••2-ch. DDR3-1333 SODIMM sockets up to 16 GB ••7 PCIe x1, 2 SATA III, 2 SATA II, 8 USB 2.0, GbE

••ATX form factor development board ••Supports COM 2.0 type 6 & 10 pin-out ••LVDS, HDMI, DVI, DisplayPort, SDVO, VGA ••PEG, PCIe x1, SATA, GbE, SPI, LPC, SDIO

••Intel® Atom™ E6xx series up to 1.6 GHz ••1 GB DDR2 on-board memory ••1-ch. 24-bit LVDS, SDVO ••PCIe x1, GbE

Backlight

GPIO

Hardware Monitor

SMBus

I2C

Watchdog

Built-in iManager utility and APIs improve hardware and software integration Advantech iManager compliant with EAPI 1.0 standard

Technology Forum

27

Product In-Depth

New

Products

Advantech Embedded Boards Receive 2011 Taiwan Excellence Awards Advantech is proud to announce that SOM-5788 COM-Express Basic Module, PCM-3362 Ruggedized PC/104-Plus SBC, and PCM-9562 EBX SBC, have each had the honor of receiving a “2011 Taiwan Excellence” award. The Taiwan Excellence Awards were setup in 1992 to encourage the best innovation, value, quality and design in new products. Featuring unique industrial design, add-on value with the integration of intelligent software APIs, and qualified thermal performance, these three embedded products were chosen for the outstanding usability they present to system integrators.

The Taiwan Excellence Award program has been going for over 19 years, and is highly regarded among industry insiders for highlighting the most innovative and exciting new product releases each year. The 2011 winners were recently announced on Dec. 21, 2010. According to the organization, there were 974 products from 381 companies nominated to participate in the annual award program this year. Advantech’s outstanding performance is the net result of years of experience, working closely with partners developing innovative products and solutions.

Advantech Embedded Touch Modules with Intelligent TouchWare Advantech announced the release of Embedded Touch Module, ETM-RES02C which has USB and RS-232 interfaces, and fully support use on 4 or 5-Wire Resistive type touchscreens.

Furthermore, Advantech provides TouchWare software which can divide the screen and individually set functions in each segment, making it easily integrate with each customers’ demand.

28

Product In-Depth

Advantech Industrial Storage Modules: SATA Disk on Module with Security Features Advantech Industrial Storage Module SQFlash releases a new SATA Disk on Module (DOM). SQF-SDM. SQF-SDM with standard 7-pin interface, can easily be installed into any board with a SATA interface and provides excellent shock and vibration resistance. Also, SQFSDM has security software which can fully protect intellectual property.

Product In-Depth

2011 Star Product Selection Guide 2nd Generation Intel® Core™ Processor-based Platforms Coming Soon

COM-Express R2.0, Type 6 SOM-5890

Mini-ITX AIMB-272

Micro ATX AIMB-581

ATX AIMB-781

PICMG 1.3 SHB PCE-5126

ATX ASMB-781

■ Intel Core + QM67 ■ 95 x 125mm

■ Intel Core + QM67 ■ 170 x 170 mm

■ Intel Core + Q67 ■ 244 x 244 mm

■ Intel Core i7/i5/i3 +

■ Intel Core i7/i5/i3 +

■ Intel Core i3 ■ 304.8 x 244 mm

(4.92” x 3.74”)

(6.69” x 6.69”)

■ Dual Channel up to

(9.6” x 9.6”)

■ Dual Channel up to

16GB

■ Dual Channel up to

8GB

16GB

Q67/B65 ■ 338 x 122 mm (13.3” x 4.8”) ■ Dual Channel up to 8GB

Q67/B65 ■ 304.8 x 244 mm (12” x 9.6”) ■ Dual Channel up to 16GB

(12” x 9.6”) ■ Dual Channel up to

32GB

Intel® Atom™ E6xx Processor-based Platforms

COM-Ultra SOM-7564

QSeven SOM-3564

COM-Express Compact SOM-6764

PCI-104 PCM-3364

3.5” SBC PCM-9364

■ Standalone Intel Atom E6xx

■ Standalone Intel Atom E6xx

■ Intel Atom E6xx Processor

■ Intel Atom E6xx Processor

■ Intel Atom E6xx Processor

Processor Series ■ 84 x 55 mm (3.3”x2.17”) ■ On-board 1GB

Processor Series ■ 70 x 70 mm (2.76”x2.76”) ■ On-board 1GB

Series + Intel Platform Controller Hub EG20T ■ 95 x 95 mm (3.74”x3.74”) ■ On-board 1GB

Series + Intel Platform Controller Hub EG20T ■ 96 x 90 mm (3.8”x3.5”) ■ On-board 1GB

Series + Intel Platform Controller Hub EG20T ■ 146 x 102 mm (5.7”x4”) ■ On-board 1GB

Intel® Atom™ N455/D525 Processor-based Platforms

COM-Ultra SOM-7562 B1

COM-Express Compact PCI-104 SOM-6763 B1 PCM-3363

■ Intel Atom N455 ■ 84 x 55 mm

■ Intel Atom N455/ D525 ■ 95 x 95 mm

(3.3”x2.17”)

■ On-board DDR3 1GB

(3.74” x 3.74”)

■ DDR3 SO-DIMM

up to 4GB (D525)

■ Intel Atom N455/

3.5” SBC PCM-9363

■ Intel Atom N455/ D525 D525 ■ 96 x 90 mm ■ 146 x 102 mm (3.8”x3.5”) (5.7”x 4”) ■ On-board DDR3 1GB ■ DDR3 SO-DIMM up to 4GB

Mini-ITX AIMB-213

Haf-size SBC PCA-6782

Embedded BOX IPC ARK-1503

■ Intel Atom N455/

■ Intel Atom N455/

D525 ■ 170 x 170 mm (6.69” x 6.69”) ■ DDR3 SO-DIMM up to 4GB

D525 ■ 185 x 122 mm (7.3” x 4.8”) ■ DDR2 SO-DIMM up to 2GB

■ Intel Atom D425/ D525 ■ 230.6 x 133 x 44.4 mm

Product In-Depth

29

(9.08” x 5.24” x 1.75”) ■ DDR3 SO-DIMM

up to 4GB