A field-programmable gate array (FPGA) is a semiconductor device that can be configured by the customer or designer after manufacturing?hence the name "field-programmable". FPGAs are programmed using a logic circuit diagram or a source code in a hardware description language (HDL) to specify how the chip will work. They can be used to implement any logical function that an application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC) could perform, but the ability to update the functionality after shipping offers advantages for many applications.
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FPGA Implementations Sometimes Need a Coprocessor
FPGAs are the de facto choice for military algorithm processing in land- , sea- and air-based platforms. They’ve increasingly replaced stand-alone DSPs because FPGAs offerRead More...
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Advanced Low-Power PMC Supports Dual Graphics Heads A blend of graphics and video performance is vital for advanced sensor fusion, image/frame capture and recording inRead More...
Data Acq Boards Ride the USB and FPGA Waves
The role of the data acquisition subsystems at the heart of military applications–like radar, sonar, SIGINT and broadband comms–remains the same. They still capture, digitize and thenRead More...
What's the Computer Inside?
When I participate in any kind of press meeting or briefing, I’m the guy who always asks a question–or many questions. I ask questions to satisfy my naturally curious nature, but alsoRead More...
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20-Inch 2U Chassis for Trenton 32 Gbyte Boards The days when military system developers did everything themselves are long gone. They’d much rather find building blocks to pieceRead More...
Data Acquisition Boards Roundup
USB Analog Input Modules Are Software Selectable USB has earned its way into the mindshare of military data acquisition system designers. ACCES I/O’s latest offering in the USBRead More...
VPX Trade-Offs: Getting to Common Backplanes
The first wave of “beachhead” innovators and early adopter customers for VPX (VITA 46) boards and subsystems quickly established the preeminence of the architecture. They wereRead More...
Exciting Times
This is an exciting time to be in the embedded military electronics market. A time for agile companies that can fight through or avoid internal corporate anxiety. Between world affairsRead More...
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BGA Adapters Adapt 0.50 mm Devices to 1.00 mm Boards Keeping up with and mitigating the impact of component obsolescence is a constant challenge in the military industry. ICs oftenRead More...
VPX and VXS Strike a Balance of Choices for Designers
Developers of high-performance embedded computing systems for defense must satisfy both tactical and technical requirements of the programs they serve. Since the life cycle of mostRead More...
New Solutions Attack the Defense Industry’s Most Compute-Centric Problems
There's a trend that should be obvious, but is often overlooked at higher echelons of the defense industry: More and more of system functionality is now implemented as software runningRead More...
FPGA Computing Solutions Help Radar Systems Keep Pace
Modern radar systems are operating over an ever increasing frequency range. Advances in analog conversion technology–both A/D and D/A converters–have lead to systems becoming highlyRead More...
Technology Focus: Conduction-Cooled cPCI Boards
Rad-Tolerant SBC Boasts Low Operating Power Space-based applications require a level beyond the typical definition of ruggedness. Aitech Defense Systems offers aRead More...
The Inside Track
ITT Awarded JTRS Support Contract ITT has been awarded a $22.9 million contract for Single Channel Ground and Airborne Radio Systems (SINCGARS) Software In-Service Support (SwISS)Read More...
PXI, VXI and LXI Boards Each Find Their Instrumentation Strengths
At one time, it took a whole rack of test gear to implement military and aerospace test systems. Now that same functionality can be built using standards-based instrumentation andRead More...
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Recorder and Signal Conditioner Team for Rugged Duties When you can integrate any technology down to a significantly smaller size and weight, sometimes that opens up a wholeRead More...
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3U cPCI Board and Rack Family Satisfies Extreme Thermal Needs CompactPCI, particularly in its 3U flavor, is no longer the new kid on the block in the military market. It’s paidRead More...
FPGA Boards Revamp the Radar and SIGINT Landscapes
Waveform-intensive applications like sonar, radar and SIGINT seem to have an endless appetite for signal processing power. Faster DSPs coupled with a broader range of IP cores andRead More...
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Tiny SMD Fuse Approved for Space Applications Reliability and ruggedness take on a whole new meaning for electronics used in space applications. There’s no repair truckRead More...
Technology Focus: Rugged Box-Level Systems Roundup
Small Core Duo Box Has PC/104 I/O Expansion The concept of the “stand-alone rugged” box has infiltrated the military embedded market in a big way. The latest example is ACCES I/ORead More...
FPGA Boards Deliver DSP Muscle and I/O Flexibility
As FPGAs evolve to ever greater sophistication, complete systems can now be integrated into one or more FPGAs. Board-level product developers continue to ride that wave in two ways. OnRead More...
Space-Qualified Boards and ICs Satisfy Rad Hard Needs
Electronic systems designed for space face unique requirements over and above those of any typical military application. Satellites designed for space missions, for example, have toRead More...
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Quad-Core Intel Xeon-Based VME SBC The multicore trend has swept through the military embedded computing industry, and military system developers are embracing it with open arms.Read More...
DSP Propels Military Digital Data Recording into High Gear
Data recording used to be a fairly straightforward process–digitize the data and stream it to a storage subsystem fast enough to keep up in real time. Data analysis was done mostlyRead More...
FPGA Processing Boards Roundup
PMC Uses Virtex 5 FPGA for Speedy I/O Processing At one time FPGAs served merely as glue logic interfaces. Now they function as complete processing engines. Acromag’s PMC-VFXRead More...
Power Conversion Rinvents Itself for the FPGA Age
The military market isn’t exactly keen to ride the bleeding edge when it comes to embracing new power supply and power conversion concepts. But it’s had no choice than to evolve inRead More...
Space Industry Looks toward On-the-Fly Reconfiguration
The market for space equipment worldwide is growing rapidly. Development cycles are becoming increasingly costly and time-consuming, but at the same time, equipment designers areRead More...
Quad Channel, Low Jitter Clock Generator Rides FMC
Demanding military applications such as Electronic Counter Measures, Software Defined Radio and radar have a big appetite for high-speed ADC and DAC components. Curtiss-WrightRead More...
Bandwidth and Legacy Needs Drive VPX/VXS/VME Choice
Just past its 25-year mark, VME has been the embedded computing mainstay for military and aerospace applications. And while its capabilities are still solid as a rock, new computingRead More...
The Inside Track
Mercury Delivers Aegis Weapon System Upgrade for Lockheed Martin Mercury Computer Systems has delivered on an initial order and received a follow-on order from Lockheed Martin for theRead More...
Space Qualified ICs and Systems Leap New Hurdles
With the Space Shuttle program over and the commercial space industry taking the baton, the space electronics industry is certainly in a period of transition. Feeding those needs,Read More...
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Managed Ethernet Switch Rides 3U CompactPCI Attracted by its ubiquity and longevity, the military is growing ever more fond of Ethernet. And switched Ethernet is becoming asRead More...
Processing and Musical Chairs
Okay embedded processing technologies, when the music stops I want each of you to grab a chair and sit. Musical chairs is a good way to describe the moving targets that are advancedRead More...
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VME SBC Serves Up Low Power Core 2 Duo The Core 2 Duo has become among the most prevalent CPUs in new embedded computer designs in the past couple of years. Its mix of performance andRead More...
XMCs and PrXMCs Open Door to New Levels of Performance
Mezzanine cards have held an entrenched position in military embedded systems since the early days of SBCs and standard backplanes. They enable system developers to mix and match theRead More...
Development System Marries Blackfin and .NET Micro Framework
Development System Marries Blackfin and .NET Micro Framework The FPGA Mezzanine Card (FMC) form factor, also called VITA 57, takes advantage of the trend toward complete subsystemRead More...
FPGA-based Ethernet Module Sportsa High-Capacity Switch-IP
FPGA-Based Ethernet Module Sports a High-Capacity Switch-IP An industrial Ethernet module (IEM) implements a cost-efficient and flexible solution to adapt to various IndustrialRead More...
Serial FPDP Board Roundup
VME Card Provides 24 Serial FPDP Channels Using FPGAs in conjunction with the Serial FPDP (sFPDP) interconnect makes for a powerful combination. Such a solution has enormousRead More...
PXI, VXI and LXI Boards Roundup
16-bit PXI Digitizers Boast up to 40 MS/s Sampling High-channel count and simultaneous sampling are the watchwords for a variety of military test applications. Feeding those needs,Read More...
Processor Mezzanines Roundup
PMC Modules Interface I/O to Virtex-5 FPGAs Performance in mission-critical applications is never purely a measure of computing power. Unless data can be brought off and ontoRead More...
GPU-based Processing Solves Persistent Surveillance Challenges
Persistent surveillance requires highly compute-intensive imaging capabilities because the aerial vehicle must remain (on demand) in an area to detect, locate, characterize,Read More...
PCI Express Modules Target Beamforming Apps
PCI Express Modules Target Beamforming Apps High-performance data acquisition was once limited to general-purpose solutions. But as embedded board solutions have evolved,Read More...
DSP-Based Motion Controllers Offer Full Closed-Loop Control
DSP-Based Motion Controllers Offer Full Closed-Loop Control Two DSP-based servo motion controllers handle three or six axes of control. The PCI-8253 (three axes) and PCI-8256Read More...
Virtex-6 FPGA Module Targets Radar and Telemetry Apps
The latest high-end FPGAs have been a real game-changer for radar and telemetry system designs. Pentek's 71620 module is a multichannel, high-speed data converter XMC that is designedRead More...
FPGAs Push Integrated Data Recorder Systems Beyond Number Crunching
The use of Field Programmable Gate Arrays (FPGAs) for advanced military signal processing has become an obvious choice to achieve maximum performance within the limited size, weightRead More...
Small Boards Serve Up Overlapping Innovations
Long gone are the days when small form factor boards were limited to a few types of standard form factors like PC/104. Today, while strategies vary among the various small embeddedRead More...
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3U VPX SBC Sports Freescale MPC 8640D Processor There have been only a handful of SBC vendors so far that have rolled out VPX products. The ones that jumped on board haveRead More...
FPGA Boards Rev Up for Signal Processing Duties
Military applications like sonar, radar, SIGINT and software radio—all of which rely on heavy amounts of waveform processing—continue to leverage advances in FPGA technology. FasterRead More...
FPGA Processing Boards Roundup
Virtex-5 FPGA PMC Aims at I/O Processing At one time FPGAs served merely as glue logic interfaces. Now they function as complete processing engines. Acromag’s PMC-VFX modulesRead More...
Five Game-Changer Technology Trends Facing the Military
Compute-density has become the mantra for many of today's advanced military programs. More and more of system functionality is now implemented as software running on single boardRead More...
3U cPCI Card Serves Up FPGA and Atom CPU
FPGAs are now powerful enough to be used alongside general-purpose CPUs as coprocessors. MEN Micro offers a 3U CompactPCI SBC that combines low-power Intel Atom XL processors withRead More...
FPGA Boards and Systems Boost UAV Payload Compute Density
Large UAV platforms–like Global Hawk, Predator, Fire Scout, Taranis and others–have a seemingly endless appetite for greater onboard compute density. The payloads aboard those systemsRead More...
Rugged Ethernet Switch Boards Roundup
Dual-Channel 10GbE XMC Ready for Rough Duties The military has become sold on the idea of using Ethernet not only as a network technology but also as a fabric interconnect. TheRead More...
DSP Architectures Close the ISR Collection-Analysis Gap
Today’s climate of rapidly evolving asymmetric threats is forcing the U.S. military to quickly adapt in order to maintain tactical situational awareness. However, the traditionalRead More...
FPGAs Take On Expanded Processing Roles
Once used merely as glue logic, FPGAs are now complete systems on a chip. And now that many of them even have general-purpose CPU cores on them, the military is hungry to use FPGAs toRead More...
Deep Packet Inspection FPGA Net Accelerator Rides PCI Express
The PCIe-180 FPGA network accelerator card from Nallatech is capable of real-time deep packet inspection and processing of 10 Gbit Ethernet traffic. The card can dynamically switchRead More...
AMC Boards Blend FPGA, DSP and I/O Capabilities
AMC mezzanines have become a fixture in comms-centric military systems. Serving such needs, CommAgility announced two new AdvancedMC modules based on the latest high-performanceRead More...
Silicon Valley’s Still Got It
For a technology geek like me, there’s something special about Silicon Valley that’s undeniable. Aside from the northeast where I’m from and have my roots, that area of northernRead More...
System-Level Approach Wins for UAV Radar Payload Designs
Over the last decade the use of UAVs has grown from a rarity—strictly in support of high-risk military operations—to virtually commonplace, supporting border security, drug enforcementRead More...
PXI/CompactPCI Backplanes for Embedded Test and Control OEMs
More than 10 new 3U and 6U PXI/CompactPCI backplanes offer from 4 to 18 slots and work with PXI, PXI Express, CompactPCI and CompactPCI Express modules. Engineers can design customRead More...
Serial FPDP Provides Throughput Advantages for Sensor I/O
Military embedded systems have started to use standard network interfaces for all types of communication. By embracing network-based architectures, new systems are inherentlyRead More...
