By Cheryl Coupé

While COTS and Telecom-Oriented Architectures Make Inroads, Legacy Standards Continue to Evolve to Meet Needs

Today’s military wants it all: higher performance, backwards compatibility, and increasingly stringent size, weight and power (SWaP) features – all within tighter budget constraints. Luckily, there are lots of choices available to designers these days to meet those demands. Architectures such as AdvancedTCA – designed to meet the needs for next-generation telecom systems – as well as other commercial-off-the-shelf board standards are finding their way into mil/aero applications, even as traditional VME and its relatives continue to evolve. Our expert panel –James B. Doyle, Congressional Affairs Liaison – Director Military, Aerospace & Government Embedded Computing for Emerson Network Power; John Long, product line manager at RadiSys; and Mike Southworth, director of marketing for Parvus – give their insight on how this will all shake out.

EE Catalog: What trends are driving military, aerospace and defense engineering at the embedded level?

James B. Doyle, Emerson Network Power: Based on our customer discussions we continue to hear that size, weight and power (SWaP) is still at the top of mind for designers and engineers. Environmental operating temperatures and rugged system deployment dictates systems requirements and how much processing power and bandwidth can be transferred through specific components. The real thing that engineering teams have started to realize – and which is driving more designs – is commercially-adopted technology. We have hit the tipping point where programs need to save cost due to diminished funding, solving challenging capabilities with good enough technology – when it’s appropriate. In addition to all these, interoperability with the ecosystem to minimize longer term program risk and stability of supply is very important for major programs. The companies that can team together efficiently have the best chance for joint technology insertion.

John Long, RadiSys: The transition to Network Centric Warfare (NCW) has been a primary trend in recent years, fundamentally changing the way the military operates. Until recently, each military command unit worked either independently or in unison with the command center. Information was sent from the battleground to the command unit, which would then process the information and relay orders back to the field. However, this process could take anywhere from a few minutes to a few days, and the military soon recognized that this model would not be successful in modern warfare. For example, if an enemy target is spotted, the unit needs to accumulate the information quickly and give the orders immediately. This requires that all information be transmitted and the command to action sent in under a minute.

This transition to NCW has upped the ante for mil/aero system designers, creating the need for systems that can transmit and process precise information in real-time. A mil/aero communication and command system must offer high-end compute processing as well as high bandwidth to quickly and effectively transmit different types of packets for various applications such as video surveillance, all while avoiding information latency. As a result, we are seeing more systems built on standards such as AdvancedTCA (ATCA) and COM Express, creating systems that are scalable to this level of required data transmission.

Mike Southworth, Parvus: Tactical vehicle and aircraft applications continue to push for greater and greater situational awareness capabilities from their embedded electronic subsystems. This is driving requirements for higher levels of computational density and faster network fabrics in these mil-aero architectures. Multi-core processing, multi-Gigabit Ethernet, and PCI Express links are becoming more common and replacing traditional single-core systems that utilized legacy parallel buses and slower wire speed links.

EE Catalog: Size, weight and power (SWaP) requirements seem to get more demanding, especially for applications such as unmanned vehicles, along with the need for higher performance video and data processing. What new technologies are you watching to meet these needs going forward?

Doyle, Emerson Network Power: There are some really interesting new things on the horizon, not just evolving technology, but unique ways that innovators are using existing technologies to solve complex problems. Sometimes it just makes more sense to think inside in the box (no pun). Here is a great example of this principal: I just came back from a trip on the West Coast where I had the opportunity to meet with some special project engineers for the US Navy. During a walk, we happened by an older underwater unmanned vehicle (UUV). As we talked they told me that this design was actually developed for the Gemini space program back in the early 1960s, which certainly grabbed my attention. They went on to tell me that if they were to design and build this particular system again in today’s dollars it would cost more than a billion dollars, then they went on to say that when it was completed it never even saw service. The UUV worked perfectly for the space capsule retrieval missions it was designed for during re- entry events in the ocean, but before deployment the Navy realized it was just easier to use human divers instead of technology; a simple solution to a challenging problem. So what does this mean for our industry and the military for technology? It means that we have great technology today that can solve much more complicated challenges; we just need to think of them with open minds and fresh eyes.

Long, RadiSys: The COM Express standard has made significant inroads in the mil/aero industry as a result of its feature set and SWaP offerings. As a two-board, two-connector solution, COM Express helps reduce system complexity while delivering the latest processing and performance capabilities for demanding mil/aero applications in a small form factor. A single COM Express module can provide the processing and graphics performance of multiple PC/104 board systems – a traditional mil/aero standard – while offering significant space savings and performance consolidation. COM Express standard developers also planned for today’s video explosion; the module offers standard connector access for VGA, LVDS, DisplayPort, DVI, HDMI and more. Additionally, because it offers easy technology insertions and upgrades, COM Express offers a long-life solution for high-performance mil/aero systems.

Southworth, Parvus: Modular, small form factor PC/104 boards continue to serve the unmanned vehicle marketplace quite well where Size, Weight and Power (SWaP) constraints are prevalent. The new PCI/104-Express standard is of special interest as it augments the architecture with high-speed serial switch fabric support to enable higher performance I/O interfaces. In addition, 3U Open VPX and related small form factor VITA standards are technologies to watch as some legacy 6U applications turn to 3U or smaller.

EE Catalog: How important is backwards compatibility to legacy architectures versus meeting new system demands? How are engineers balancing these trade-offs?

Doyle, Emerson Network Power: I believe that backwards compatibility is very important. I am often asked this same question but phrased in a different way: “How long will VME be around?” We are working with the Navy today on a collaborative research and development award that is studying the technology refresh cycles and end-of-life for existing VME boards deployed on afloat systems. What shocked me was that some of these systems truly are from first generation VME – back 25 years ago! There are several complete forklift upgrades going on today. The Consolidated Afloat Network Enterprise System (CANES) program is a prime example. The Navy is looking at their stovepipe networks, interoperability and service costs to maintain many unique systems and is actively working to decrease the number of shipboard platforms, which is a great thing for our industry and our Navy. But there are many, and I mean many, systems that just need the next evolution of VME to keep running. These systems require backwards compatibility and can’t have entire system upgrades due to legacy. The trade-offs are simple for engineers – spend a billion dollars getting something approved through re-certification or continue to use legacy technology that is readily available. Unless other constraints demand change, we see little stopping those tried and tested three letters … “VME.”

Long, RadiSys: The downfall for legacy architectures is that they were not designed to scale for current and immediate bandwidth and computing requirements needed to transmit and process video traffic securely. They do not offer the same high availability as today’s ATCA and COM Express standards. We’ve seen that if an incremental, backward-compatible technology upgrade is available, integrators will update systems using the improved version of the legacy architecture. The decision to replace legacy architecture is often weighed with financial considerations including how long the deployment is expected to last. For example, replacing a legacy VME system in a current deployment where a large number of systems is already deployed and only expected to last another 3-5 years might not be an efficient solution. Incremental system requirements in terms of bandwidth and processing power can be best achieved by adopting extended temperature, modular COM Express processing units on VME or VPX carriers.

However, for new command, control, communications, computers, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (C4ISR) systems such as unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) and for upgrading onboard ship networks or in-air reconnaissance missions—systems that often require rack mount, server-class compute performance, high availability and high-resolution video traffic bandwidth capacity—system integrators are moving toward newer standards such as ATCA that offer field-proven high availability and the framework to scale and expand for future demands.

Southworth, Parvus: Within the PC/104 ecosystem, options abound to support legacy ISA and PCI bus expansion, as well as combinations with high speed PCI-Express. Mixing and matching of I/O expansion cards with the appropriate single board computer (SBC) provides great flexibility in PC/104-based systems to look backwards and forward in mil/aero architectures. The death of ISA and PCI has long been predicted, but will take quite a while yet before it becomes reality, because of how simple they are to use and the huge supplier ecosystem.

EE Catalog: How do ATCA/MicroTCA architectures compete with standards such as VPX in military/aerospace applications?

Doyle, Emerson Network Power: There are many crossovers and similarities between these technologies for application use cases in the military, but I think the word “compete” may be the wrong word here. AdvancedTCA was the largest specification effort in the history of embedded computing and was targeted to requirements for the next generation of “carrier grade” communications equipment, where OpenVPX is the next evolution of hardened, ruggedized deployable military processing systems.

If you divide the military application needs into two segments – the first being infrastructure, the latter being C4 (command-and-control communicate, communicate and compute) – you can clearly delineate where all of these technologies fit. ATCA technology is perfect for large infrastructure systems and with MicroTCA technology you can utilize the same ATCA building blocks in a much smaller form factor and leverage all the system management and communication standards that were designed into ATCA. This is perfect for supercomputing and net-centric battlefield applications in more of a benign environment such as a shelter, shipborne or large aerial platforms where space is less of an issue. OpenVPX, with both 6U and 3U form factors, allows designers to look at size, weight and power constraints more independently than large infrastructure type platforms; this gives them the flexibility to choose the right solution for the right application. Today we’re seeing an even split between 3U and 6U form factor designs. In the near future we may see an evolution of this technology for OpenVPX to an even smaller form factor for systems residing on UAVs, or carried individually for man-portable devices.

Long, RadiSys: ATCA, MicroTCA and VPX are all proven contenders for next-generation compute systems. However, when it comes to delivering the high performance required for today’s mil/aero applications, ATCA delivers several advantages over VPX. ATCA offers 2.7 times the board size of VPX, affording developers more area to incorporate multiple processors, chipsets, memory and graphic processor units (GPUs) in its form factor and thereby enabling a more powerful design. ATCA has 1.7 times the thermal budget of VPX, allowing vendors to integrate higher performance server class components. Additionally, ATCA offers 10 times the bandwidth of current VPX systems, supporting the fast inter-board communications required for today’s network-centric operations. As a ruggedized, field-proven solution, ATCA is an ideal platform for high bandwidth and high compute applications.

Southworth, Parvus: ATCA/MicroTCA has yet to achieve the technology readiness level in military applications that VPX claims, due to VPX’s ability to piggyback on a lengthy VME heritage. Fewer rugged ACTA/MicroTCA systems seem to be available at this point, while rugged VPX systems are being fielded and supported by a large base of vendors.

EE Catalog: Which commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) technologies are your mil/aero customers leveraging successfully?

Doyle, Emerson Network Power: You really hit upon all the technologies listed above – ATCA, MicroTCA, OpenVPX and the next generation of VME. All of these open standard, commercial off-the-shelf technologies are truly helping to solve challenging capability requirements in the military. They all bring actionable intelligence directly to the war fighter in their own ways. I think when we look back 10 years from now, we will look upon this time and realize that it was a transition – from the old proprietary systems to the readily available and adoptable COTS architectures. Designers have such an array of things to choose from today, it’s really going to come down to what solutions they truly need. Like the Gemini space program of the 1960s, sometimes the simplest solution to a challenging problem is not only the right answers, it’s the most elegant and efficient. Commercial off-the-shelf technology can be that answer.

Long, RadiSys: ATCA and COM Express have both seen enormous growth in the mil/aero sector. Originally designed for bandwidth-heavy applications in the telecom industry, ATCA is being adopted across the industry because of its modularity, field-proven reliability and performance offerings. We’ve especially seen success with pre-integrated ATCA platforms for mobile command and control applications. Additionally, extended temperature COM Express modules are often an ideal solution for mil/aero designs. These modules are rugged enough to handle the most extreme military environments, yet efficient enough to be used in systems such as UAV and wearable units, which have stringent power and heat dissipation requirements. Both standards offer rugged, high performance modular solutions for mil/aero systems and can be scaled to meet individual application requirements.

Southworth, Parvus: More and more Parvus customers are leveraging pre-qualified, pre-integrated COTS computing and networking subsystems than custom designs. These standard COTS subsystems are deployable off the shelf, yet they are also modular and optimizable. Parvus’ application and design engineering teams routinely augment generic platforms with application-specific I/O interfaces and mechanical changes to rapidly tailor solutions to program-specific requirements. Pre-integrated and tested subsystems reduce the learning curve and risk for integrators, extend base functionality and maximizes the use of COTS content for their mil-aero programs.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, February 1st, 2011 at 12:37 pm and is filed under Article, News.