IDT Introduces High Performance, Lowest Power Serial RapidIO Switches For The Embedded Market

San Jose, CA - IDT (Integrated Device Technology, Inc.), a leading provider of essential mixed-signal semiconductor solutions that enrich the digital media experience, recently announced a new family of devices - central packet switches (CPS) that address the interconnect needs of those embedded applications that utilize DSPs, FPGAs or processors. The CPS solutions incorporate in-house third-generation IDT SERDES and serial RapidIO core switch technology to provide customers with superior flexibility, scalability, performance, and power consumption at very competitive costs. These best-in-class switches provide significant system advantages in connecting virtually any digital media component to any other, in applications ranging from wireless infrastructure to enterprise storage, imaging applications, and beyond.

The CPS family enables combinations of performance, cost, and function previously impossible, by offering industry-leading flexibility, specifically 4x and 1x port options coupled with enhanced features for system bring-up and debug. The CPS family of solutions includes three device configurations - with 16-port, 12-port, and 8-port options for 1x port counts. Moreover, the CPS family is pin-to-pin compatible with the IDT PPS Gen 2 family of devices, allowing customers the flexibility to upgrade their next-generation systems to the more powerful pre-processing solution with no impact on hardware or board design.

"The CPS devices are a great addition to our industry-leading portfolio of RapidIO solutions, which include our pre-processing switches and the 10G Serial Buffer. These newest enhanced solutions provide additional value-add benefit for our customers and to the markets they serve," said Thomas Brenner, vice president and general manager for the IDT Flow Control Management Division. "Based on customer and industry feedback, we have learned that designers of the core technologies needed in digital media devices - they want to work with just one company that can reliably be their sole point of contact, from the physical elements of the device to every aspect of its operation, from board to system level. Whether its hardware or software, our customers want to be able to pick up a phone once, get a fast answer to their questions, and be done. We anticipate and address those needs by working with them when we're developing solutions, and continue to partner with them from their design to post-production phases."

Thomas continues, "Our customers recognize us as the industry best, not only on technical merit, but also on the partner-level support that we bundle with our solutions. This has helped us accelerate the acceptance of RapidIO as a standard, and resulted in a fast-growing range of major design wins across applications ranging from wireless base stations to high-end imaging."

Leveraging the serial RapidIO , JTAG and I2C interconnect standards, the IDT CPS family specifically addresses such markets as wireless and wireline, imaging, medical, military, IPTV, and other high-end communications markets and embedded applications. Following the IDT initiative to provide unparalleled performance in power smart configurations, the CPS family offers IDT customers a best-in-class solution through fastest possible time-to-market and smallest package size available for this class of products. Supporting software solutions provided for the CPS and PPS switch families include an IDT-developed calculator that allows customers to calculate power usage in various usage profiles. Customers can use this calculator to adjust device options to achieve maximum power savings.

Based upon proven-IDT pre-processing technology, the CPS family includes an advanced feature set developed in conjunction with IDT customers to meet their specific interconnect needs. This feature set is built into the IDT solution to benefit customers when they are in the design phase, but also enables critical diagnostics during early stages of testing, and continues to be useful in the end-application. In addition, the CPS devices are configurable through any of the Serial RapidIO, JTAG, or I2C ports. The devices include a "loopback mode" which enables customers the added flexibility to work with the physical layer of the IDT device and quickly identify the source of any performance bottlenecks. Improving customer time-to-market, the CPS also incorporates useful diagnostics that provide customers with added security and faster time-to-market. These enhanced functions provide "kill" and "trace/mirror" capabilities that enable an added layer of security that is often critical in embedded applications.

SOURCE: Integrated Device Technology, Inc.