Following the success of the ComStruct VME/C6420 DSP resource board in third generation (3G) wireless applications, Blue Wave Systems (NASDAQ:BWSI) today announced the availability of a high performance subsystem consisting of the VME/C6420, a C6000-based VME board, and a 300-K gate FPGA-based PMC co-processor module. This new ComStruct subsystem delivers the processing power and high bandwidth data paths required by the latest 3G wideband wireless standards.
The flexible architecture and high bandwidth provided by the VME/C6420 has led to its design into numerous 3G basestation and handset demonstrators. Now, with the added capability provided by the FPGA module, even higher levels of baseband processing are available in a single slot. Wireless applications, including current 2G and future 3G cellular systems, have a number of processing intensive tasks that do not always require the flexibility of the DSP. Within the baseband processing subsystems, algorithms such as Viterbi, turbo encode/decode, and spreading and de-spreading functions may be performed within FPGAs, thereby freeing valuable DSP power for other tasks.
The VME/C6420's unique multiprocessor architecture is ideally suited for the high bandwidth, packet-based transfers found in 3G. The board provides multiple 200-Mbytes/sec links, connecting the four on-board DSPs (C6201, fixed-point, or C6701, floating-point), external I/O, host VMEbus, and the on-board MPC860 RISC processor. The new ComStruct PMC/FPGA module extends this architecture to allow the connection of FPGAs at up to 200 Mbytes/sec. This connection enables the board to handle the radio data rates found within baseband processing units.
Use of the ComStruct DSP and FPGA subsystem is well suited to wireless signal intelligence (SIGINT) as well as commercial telecom applications. The Xilinx Virtex(TM) device is ideal for implementing digital receivers capable of returning digital radio IF (intermediate frequency) signals to baseband. Karl Wale, Blue Wave Systems product marketing manager, explains, "Using the dynamically re-configurable Virtex allows users to implement both wideband and narrowband receivers within the same hardware, switching between them as required. This flexibility is ideal for use in SIGINT applications or for implementing specialized modulation schemes."
The ComStruct VME/C6420 and PMC/FPGA subsystem is available with a suite of VxWorks(R) libraries. Additionally, the DSP board is supported by Texas Instruments' Code Composer Studio(TM) development environment, with the Xilinx Virtex device supported by Xilinx's Alliance and Foundation Series software products. Blue Wave Systems also provides optimized cores with the PMC/FPGA module to simplify development of the end application.
This ComStruct subsystem will be available later this quarter at a price of $9,950 in volume.
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