Product category: CompactPCI Boards and Assemblies
News Release from: Force Computers | Subject: Centellis CO31KX
Edited by the Electronicstalk Editorial Team on 8 July 2004

Platform puts open standards
to central office use

The Centellis CO31KX is an open-standards-based modular communications platform designed for central office deployment

It is the first to combine AdvancedTCA, Carrier Grade Linux and the software interface specifications as determined by the Service Availability Forum (SAF). Engineered to support "5-nines" (99.999%) availability in a central office environment, the CO31KX provides all the features required to act as a common system platform.

These address the needs of a wide array of network infrastructure applications, such as radio access equipment (eg RNC, BSC) and elements of the mobile core infrastructure (eg SGSN, GGSN, HLR/VLR, media gateway).

Through a broad set of modular building blocks, such as the new ATCA 715/717 single board computer (SBC) blade based on the Intel Pentium M 745 processor, the Centellis CO31KX can be configured to fit the needs of a multitude of wireline and wireless infrastructure applications.

"The ATCA standard has been in existence for 18 months now, and after shipping a number of ATCA board-level building blocks and development systems for evaluation and prototyping, our Tier 1 TEM customers are now ready to deploy", said Paul Mercadante, President of Force Computers.

"Our customers tell us that ATCA is the first open standard that addresses their needs, and is also capable of replacing proprietary equipment".

"They have verified the technical capabilities of the ATCA standard and our products, and are now convinced that they can achieve significant capital and operational expense reductions through these new standards-based, modular platforms".

"That equals an approximate 30% saving in development time and budget, and at least 15% in product and lifecycle management cost".

The Centellis CO31KX is an evolution of the Centellis DS31KX, the industry's first ATCA development system, which has been shipping since the summer of 2003.

The new system adds the capabilities required for actual network deployment.

"Force's system introduction marks a maturation of AdvancedTCA technology going from development platforms and individual products to complete Intel processor-based deployable solutions in less than a year, and further illustrates the time to market advantages that telecomms equipment providers can capitalise on", said Howard Bubb, Intel's Vice President and General Manager of the Communications Infrastructure Group.

"Having a broad portfolio of building blocks encompassing a central-office-deployable standards-based system dramatically reduces system integration and resources required for equipment providers".

Built from Force's solid foundation of many years' experience designing carrier grade, high availability systems and the company's early leadership in creating AdvancedTCA products, the Centellis CO31KX is designed specifically for the central office.

It provides extensive system management resources, embodies sophisticated cooling capabilities and comprises NEBS level 3 capable components.

Featuring a 13U, 19in chassis with 14 vertical blade slots, the Centellis CO31KX provides a high density of functions on a rack level and supports front maintenance and rear cabling.

Configured with two gigabit Ethernet (GigE) switches for nonblocking "base channel" and "fabric channel" switching, it can be configured to accommodate several configuration options, including single board computer (SBC) blades, Gigabit Ethernet switching, and modular, scalable storage blades.

Additionally, the new platform features front-to-back, 200W per slot capacity air-cooling; and redundant shelf management controllers (ShMC) for fault-tolerant, network-based remote access to chassis information, fan trays, power entry modules and ATCA-compliant blades on the midplane.

It also provides comprehensive remote management functions by way of SNMP and PICMG-compliant SAF/HPI (hardware platform interface) managed objects, as well as via a Force object abstraction layer.

Several key building blocks, ideal for Centellis CO31KX implementation, are also available from Force.

The ATCA 715 SBC, featuring Intel's 1.6GHz Pentium M processor, delivers robust, server-class performance for control- and data-plane processing, and supports high-end communications.

With its 8U form factor, the single slot ATCA 715 is ideal for next-generation networks, as well as for telecommunications applications.

The ATCA 715 can also be configured as the ATCA 717, which features a managed, multilayered 16-port Gigabit Ethernet switch that delivers the flexibility required for routing Gigabit Ethernet interfaces between the base board Control processor, the PMC-based processing or I/O nodes, and the PICMC base and fabric interface.

Force Computers' single-slot ATCA F300 is a base and fabric interface switch that incorporates a Gigabit Ethernet interface for connecting to a shelf management controller with IPMI support and a connection for a second ATCA-F300 for redundant network architectures.

For storage, the S100, Force's ATCA single-slot storage module allows native Fibre Channel-based hard disk drive (HDD) expansion for ATCA systems such as the Centellis CO31KX.

This scalable blade-based architecture, together with on-board interface redundancy, provides a cost-effective disk capacity expansion.

The Centellis CO31KX system is now available through Force's Early Access Unit (EAU) programme.

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