XMC module suits communications, radar, telemetry, and medical systems Pentek module is built with Xilinx Virtex-6 FPGAs

Richard Nass

Embedded.com (12/01/2009 11:05 AM ET)

Pentek has released an XMC module that's suitable for connection to HF or IF ports for communications, radar, telemetry, and medical systems. The 71620 is a multichannel, high-speed data converter that's built with Xilinx's high-end Virtex-6 FPGA family. The module's analog front end features three Texas Instruments ADS5485 200-MHz 16-bit ADCs delivering excellent dynamic range and an input bandwidth of 350 MHz. In addition, a dual channel TI DAC5688 800-MHz 16-bit DAC provides two wideband analog outputs. Built-in 2x, 4x and 8x interpolation filters and a digital up-converter translate real or complex baseband input signals to any IF center frequency up to 360 MHz.

Four separate DRAM banks of 256 Mbytes offer flexibility in dedicating separate resources to I/O streams and processor requirements, eliminating the overhead associated with arbitrating for a single, shared bank. The 71620 can be optioned with QDRII+ SRAM, offering very efficient memory with separate read and write interfaces. The QDRII+ banks are each 8 Mbytes deep and are suited for structures like data streaming FIFOs, an integral part of the board's advanced DMA engines. The memory architecture is modular, giving users a choice of memory types. Applications requiring deep, fast memory can choose the DDR3.

The intelligent DMA engines can identify, timestamp and define data location and length. This simplifies the host processor's job of identifying and executing on the data.

The 71620 supports Gen 2 PCI Express as the primary control and data streaming interface. With lane widths up to x8, data can be moved on and off the board at rates up to 4 Gbytes/s. With dual XMC connectors, the module can support additional protocols, like Aurora, or RapidIO on the second connector.

Software support packages are available for Linux, Windows, and VxWorks operating systems. In addition Pentek's GateFlow Design Kit is available for custom IP development. The 71620 is immediately available starting at $11,500 USD; delivery is 8 to 10 weeks. For more information, visit www.pentek.com.