xTCA Solutions

Actel xTCA reference designs and development kits drastically reduce risk, component count, and time-to-market. The Telecommunications Computing Architecture (xTCA) series of specifications, defined by the more than 250 members of the PCI Industrial Computer Manufacturers Group (PICMG®), includes AdvancedTCA® (ATCA), AdvancedMC™ (AMC), and MicroTCA®.

These standard architectures reduce the cost of telecommunications, industrial, medical, and military equipment by establishing common physical, electrical, and functional specifications and ensuring interoperability. Manufacturers adopting these architectures are engaged in a transition similar to the replacement of the mini-computer by personal computers—a variety of custom electronic equipment will be replaced by modular, high-availability, low-cost ATCA or MicroTCA chassis and shelves.

Actel brings together the ground-breaking SmartFusion intelligent mixed signal FPGAs and Fusion mixed signal FPGAs with world-class firmware and hardware platform management leadership from Pigeon Point Systems and the FPGA design expertise of Actel Protocol Design Services to provide a compelling solution for xTCA system management.

Actel provides highly integrated solutions for system management controllers in xTCA. SmartFusion intelligent mixed signal FPGA-based and Fusion mixed signal FPGA-based solutions are supported with reference designs, development kits, intellectual property (IP), software, and customization services, enabling reduced time-to-market, less risk, lower costs, and improved availability over existing solutions for these controllers.

An ATCA Shelf Manager manages an entire shelf or chassis and represents that shelf to the logical system manager. A local controller on each board or AMC module in the shelf represents that element, monitors its health (including temperatures and voltages) and provides inventory data (such as serial number and product identifiers), among other advanced management facilities. The Pigeon Point local controller or Board Management Reference (BMR) solutions provide ready-to-use hardware and firmware, plus FPGA designs for SmartFusion- and Fusion-based variants.

AMC modules are the primary functional elements in MicroTCA systems, supported by switching, management, power, and cooling infrastructure elements. Like ATCA, MicroTCA defines shelf-level and local management controllers with similar roles and responsibilities. The Pigeon Point BMR solution family also provides ready-to-implement hardware platform management designs for these controllers.

For an overview of the xTCA management architecture and SmartFusion-based ATCA and AMC local management controllers, see the Using Intelligent Mixed Signal FPGAs for xTCA Hardware Platform Management white paper.

Whether or not they are based on standards, complex electronic systems require management. The ATCA, AMC, and MicroTCA specifications define in detail the hardware platform management functions required for compliance, building on the Intelligent Platform Management Interface (IPMI) specification. Systems based on other architectures, such as the VME frameworks established by the VITA organization, also require system management implementations, as do systems built to proprietary platform architectures.

Non-xTCA development projects across this range of platform architectures successfully use the xTCA frameworks as a starting point and map the xTCA management paradigm to their specific requirements. SmartFusion intelligent mixed signal FPGAs and Fusion mixed signal FPGAs are uniquely capable of supporting both proprietary and standards-compliant implementations in system management.

SmartFusion intelligent mixed signal FPGAs and Fusion mixed signal FPGAs enable customers to optimize xTCA system management implementations, offering integrated on-chip analog resources, embedded flash memory, live-at-power-up functionality, and intrinsically low power operation in a single-chip FPGA. This integration reduces overall system cost and board space requirements and provides the flexibility to support proprietary or standards-based system management. SmartFusion and Fusion devices deliver significant advantages to system management designers: low-power operation, functionality that is robust and firm-error immune, high reliability, and enhanced system security.

Read more about SmartFusion Benefits and Fusion Benefits.

Actel provides reference designs and design kits with hardware, software, and semiconductor intellectual property. Actel's xTCA solutions leverage Pigeon Point's system management expertise with Protocol Design Services' complementary skills and services to provide a full range of xTCA management solutions for the hardware platform management market.

• Pigeon Point Systems is the dominant supplier to leading companies worldwide of world-class management components for modular platforms based on the ATCA, AMC, and MicroTCA architectures.
• Actel Protocol Design Services provides customization services and support for semiconductor intellectual property. Protocol Design Services is directly involved in the development of Pigeon Point's BMR solutions based on SmartFusion intelligent mixed signal FPGAs and Fusion mixed signal FPGAs, and can leverage that experience to provide customization services for BMR products.

Pigeon Point BMR Starter Kits, based on Actel's SmartFusion intelligent mixed signal FPGAs and Fusion mixed signal FPGAs, implement a complete hardware platform management solution that is expandable at the hardware level by adding custom logic into the FPGA. Pigeon Point BMR kits include proven, industry-dominant Pigeon Point firmware and ready-to-adapt board-level schematics, delivering together a robust development platform for your xTCA board design program.

Pigeon Point Systems Board Management Reference Starter Kits for AdvancedTCA Boards and AdvancedMC Carrier Boards

These Pigeon Point BMR Starter Kits implement a world-class solution for developing and fielding ATCA board or AMC carrier board designs with cost-effective, interoperable, and compliant management controllers. One of the kits uses a SmartFusion intelligent mixed signal FPGA to implement a complete ATCA IPMC solution. The other kit provides the additional functionality required of an ATCA/AMC Carrier IPMC. These solutions include proven, industry-dominant firmware for both the ATCA board and AMC carrier board contexts, both running on a common bench top development board to deliver a robust development platform for your ATCA board design program.

By making use of the available on-board analog/digital resources, nonvolatile flash memory, a powerful Cortex-M3 microcontroller subsystem running at 80 MHz and live-at-power-up FPGA fabric, these ATCA designs deliver reductions in overall bill-of-materials (BOM), total parts count, and cost compared to similar legacy solutions using discrete devices.

These reference designs (and all other Pigeon Point BMR solutions based on Actel FPGAs) are offered on a royalty-free basis, eliminating the need for board manufacturers to pay additional per-board royalties and adding to the per-board savings.

Pigeon Point Systems Board Management Reference Starter Kit for AdvancedMC Modules Targeting Either ATCA AMC Carriers or µTCA Shelves

This Pigeon Point BMR Starter Kit implements a world-class solution for developing and fielding AMC module designs with cost-effective, interoperable and compliant Module Management Controllers (MMCs).

These solutions include proven, industry-dominant firmware for the MMC, running on an AMC form factor bench top development board to deliver a robust development platform for your AMC module design program. The AMC form factor of the bench top board means that you can insert it into any compliant AMC slot, in either an ATCA AMC carrier board or directly in a µTCA shelf.

By making use of the available on-board analog/digital resources, nonvolatile flash memory, a powerful Cortex-M3 microcontroller subsystem running at 40 MHz and live-at-power-up FPGA fabric, these ATCA designs deliver reductions in overall bill-of-materials (BOM), total parts count and cost compared to similar legacy solutions using discrete devices.

This reference design, like all other Pigeon Point BMR solutions based on Actel FPGAs, is offered on a royalty-free basis, eliminating the need for module manufacturers to pay additional per-board royalties and adding to the per-board savings.

Also included in the Pigeon Point SmartFusion Starter Kit BMR solutions is the most advanced, widely available implementation of IPMI over LAN functionality for ATCA/AMC management controllers, including both IPMCs and MMCs.

Note: References to IPMCs in these figures and the IPMI over LAN section below include both IPMCs and MMCs.

One application for IPMI over LAN supported by the BMR solutions is Serial over LAN (SoL), which can reduce operating expense in deployed ATCA shelves by eliminating the need to run serial cables to the console ports of CPU boards. A SoL approach to this serial traffic takes advantage of the fact that CPU boards are likely connected to an in-shelf LAN. Serial traffic is multiplexed on that LAN with other communication, simplifying configuration and operation, especially for large configurations that could have hundreds of shelves and thousands of boards. This multiplexing is accomplished in SoL-capable network controllers (NCs), which support a sideband interface to a management controller (an IPMC in the ATCA context) for SoL messages. The IPMC maintains the connection between the serial console port of the board CPU and a LAN-based client for the serial traffic via that sideband interface; the same functionality is supported for the serial debug interface of the IPMC.

Another application for IPMI over LAN is firmware upgrades for the management controller; for large upgrade images, upgrades via LAN upgrades via LAN can be faster than those via the I²C-based IPMB interface. In addition, the BMR IPMI over LAN facility for SmartFusion devices supports IPMB trace collection over LAN, which delivers a trace of IPMB messages received at or sent by the IPMC to an external analyzer. Such IPMB traces can be invaluable in solving tough integration problems.

In the Pigeon Point SmartFusion-based ATCA IPMC and AMC MMC solutions, IPMI over LAN is supported both with traditional sideband interfaces based on I²C (which are network controller device- and vendor-dependent) and those based on the Network Controller Sideband Interface (NC-SI) specification, which is NC device- and vendor-independent. NC-SI-based IPMI over LAN is supported with the Pigeon Point SmartFusion BMR solutions on any NC-SI-compliant network controller and has been verified on two specific controllers—the Intel 82575 and Broadcom BMC5714C. The physical interface for NC-SI is the Reduced Media Independent Interface (RMII), which is built into the 10/100 Mbps Ethernet MAC that is part of the SmartFusion microcontroller subsystem.

With Pigeon Point's proven reference designs and firmware, the ARM 32-bit Cortex™-M3 processor, and the unique capabilities of SmartFusion intelligent mixed signal FPGA, you gain a significant head start on your ATCA development effort when using the SmartFusion-based Pigeon Point BMR Starter Kit.

For more information on the Pigeon Point SmartFusion-based BMR Starter Kits for IPMCs and MMCs, as well as Fusion-based  kits, read the Using Intelligent Mixed Signal FPGAs for xTCA Hardware Platform Management White Paper or the Pigeon Point Systems Brochure.

Pigeon Point Systems Board Management Reference Starter Kit for MicroTCA Carrier Hub Modules

The newest Pigeon Point reference design based on Actel's Fusion mixed signal FPGA addresses the management subsystem of a MicroTCA Carrier Hub (MCH). This design takes advantage of the large capacity of the P1AFS1500 Fusion FPGA to integrate the bulk of the logic in this subsystem into the FPGA, dramatically reducing its bill-of-materials and footprint. In a BMR Fusion MCH design, Actel Core10/100 provides the necessary Ethernet connection, thirteen CoreI2C cores provide distinct logical IPMB-L instances for each AMC slot, and custom FPGA logic implements the hardware-level support for redundant MCH configurations. The provided FPGA design can be adapted and augmented to fit the needs of your MCH.

This Pigeon Point BMR solution covers all three aspects of an MCH management subsystem, including the overall Shelf Manager. All the corresponding firmware executes on an ARM Cortex-M1 processor core in the P1AFS1500 Fusion mixed signal FPGA. Existing Pigeon Point BMR MCH management subsystem solutions are widely deployed in the MicroTCA market and have been intensively validated for compliance and interoperability, and the new Fusion-based BMR MCH management solution builds upon this maturity.

Like other BMR solutions, the Fusion-based MCH BMR includes a bench top board implementing the reference design (shown above), complete with a built-in AMC management block emulating a managed AMC. Available complementary bench top boards support connecting up to two physical Power Modules (PMs; PM-TSBR board shown below, left) and a physical AMC module (AMC-TSBR board shown below, right).

With Pigeon Point's proven reference designs and firmware, the ARM 32-bit Cortex-M1 processor, and the unique capabilities of the Fusion mixed signal FPGA, you gain a significant head start on your MicroTCA Carrier Hub development effort when using this Fusion-based Pigeon Point BMR Starter Kit.

For more information on this Pigeon Point MicroTCA BMR Starter Kit, read the Pigeon Point Systems brochure or visit the Pigeon Point Systems website.

SmartFusion and Fusion Single-Chip System Management

Actel, the world's only supplier of mixed signal FPGAs, delivers a single chip that performs system management based on either SmartFusion devices or Fusion devices, as demonstrated in the xTCA reference designs described above. Actel Fusion FPGAs integrate configurable analog, large flash memory blocks, comprehensive clock generation and management circuitry, and high-performance programmable logic in a single device. In addition, SmartFusion devices deliver a powerful Cortex-M3 microcontroller subsystem and even more sophisticated programmable analog.  These levels of integration and configurability establish SmartFusion intelligent mixed signal FPGAs and Fusion mixed signal FPGAs as the definitive system management platforms.

Pigeon Point Systems has built a strong portfolio of solutions addressing xTCA integrated hardware platform management needs across the ATCA, AMC, and MicroTCA specifications. Pigeon Point BMR solutions deliver proven reference designs and starter kits specific to the type of xTCA controller you need, complete with schematics and firmware source code, ready for easy and quick integration with your board.

For more information on Pigeon Point Hardware Platform Management solutions, read the Using Intelligent Mixed Signal FPGAs for xTCA Hardware Platform Management White Paper or the Pigeon Point Systems Brochure.

Intellectual Property for ATCA, MicroTCA, IPMI, and Proprietary System Management

Actel IP cores support Actel silicon devices and can be used in xTCA and proprietary system management applications. These cores support baseboard and network management in IPMI.

• Remote Communications: Core10/100, CoreI2C, CorePCIF, and CoreUART
• Processing: Cortex-M1 and Core8051s
• Analog and Memory Interfaces: CoreFMEE, CoreAI, CorePWM, and CoreCFI
• Other I/O: CoreGPIO, CoreLPC