Embedded modules suit portable gaming

The COM 840 provides the enormous bandwidth of the PCI Express x16 interface to the baseboard
Ampro Computers supported Intel's 'Santa Rosa' embedded launch with a pair of high-performance Core 2 Duo embedded PC modules. Ampro's rugged COM 840 product offers dual-core processors with the Intel 965 chipset in the Type 2 pinout of the official PICMG COM.0 COM Express form factor up to Core 2 Duo L7500 CPU at 1.6 GHz, along with 4Mbyte of on-chip L2 cache, 800MHz front side bus (FSB), and two SODIMM sockets for up to 4Gbyte of RAM.

The COM 840 provides the enormous bandwidth of the PCI Express x16 interface to the baseboard.

The XTX 840 is an industrial grade module with the same chipset, processors, and a single RAM socket for up to 2Gbyte of RAM for easy upgrades to existing ETX and XTX baseboards.

XTX provides PCI Express x1 lanes, additional USB ports, LPC bus, and Serial ATA (SATA) to the baseboard so that new system designers can locate peripherals and connectors where they prefer.

Together, these two advanced technology pluggable modules enable a brand new class of embedded systems with ACPI power management for next-generation portable computing, imaging, gaming, signage, and streaming media applications.

'Ampro collaborated closely with Intel on these designs in order to support the initial launch of the Santa Rosa platform for the embedded market', said Joanne Mumola Williams, President and CEO of Ampro.

'Ampro is also pleased to support PICMG's efforts to promote the official COM.0 specification as well as the complementary COM Express Plug-and-Play Initiative to ensure true interchangeability of modules for the benefit of system OEMs and integrators.' At 95 x 125mm, the rugged COM 840 contains all of the PC-compatible subsystems short of I/O connectors themselves.

The I/O and bus signals are passed through high-density surface-mount connectors to a custom carrier board, according to the official COM.0 Type 2 pinout.

I/O includes two Serial ATA (SATA) ports, eight USB 2.0 ports, Gigabit Ethernet, one legacy IDE channel, and AC'97 audio.

Southbridge PCI Express x1 ('by one') lanes and the Northbridge x16 lane are brought to the baseboard for additional I/O and external graphics controller expansion, respectively.

In addition, the x16 lanes can be configured as two SDVO channels for dual displays.

High-performance DDR2 667 RAM is supported with two SODIMM sockets, providing up to 4Gbyte total RAM.

Ampro uses AMI BIOS with ACPI 2.0 support, including S3 suspend-to-RAM for fastest resume time with long battery life.

The XTX 840 is a mechanically- and electrically-compatible upgrade for hundreds of thousands of ETX baseboards in production, without having to redesign power supply circuits from +5V to +12V and change connectors and baseboard signal routing.

For new designs, XTX offers a lower-cost approach with legacy peripherals such as serial ports for customers who do not need PCI Express x16 lanes on the baseboard.

Both products are fully RoHS compliant.

QuickStart Kits for these products include a reference design COM Express baseboard with baseboard schematics and bill of materials, a heatspreader and 1Gbyte DDR RAM installed, plus device drivers and Board Support Packages (BSPs) for Windows XP, Windows XP Embedded, Windows CE, and a full Linux 2.6 distribution