Blackbird details
Early (and Easy) Additions -- Motorola's Blackbird
Architecture Looks To Take The Angst Out Of Upgrades
Carl Weinschenk
An assumption underlying virtually all network development is that significant
changes mean equally significant headaches when it comes to rebuilding and
upgrading infrastructure. Tweaking applications usually means lots of time and
money spent replacing equipment and handling problems.Because of the high
costs that improvements can generate, service providers must weigh changes
carefully: Will the new application bring in meaningful new revenue, or is it more
trouble than it's worth? The trick is finding a way to add new features quickly
without causing massive service disruption. Motorola Inc. says service providers
soon will be able to do just that. The company's Blackbird architecture promises
to let service providers change features or implement entirely new applications
without replacing equipment in customers' homes. The new functionality is
simply downloaded in software.
This idea has powerful allure for network operators. Take cable operators, for
example. For the past three years, cable companies have been deploying
proprietary cable modems, but the industry soon will switch to standards-based
versions that are starting to emerge. The transition to standards-based modems
will require that cable operators physically replace or upgrade modems, which is
costly. And operators could end up with a load of suddenly obsolete
first-generation modems. If, however, the proprietary modems were based on
Blackbird, operators could upgrade to the standards-based models simply by
downloading new software to ROM or flash memory in the consumer device.
An upgrade that normally would take months could take just minutes.
Blackbird works by coupling two powerful CPUs, Motorola's PowerPC and
"Project X" from VM Labs Inc. (Los Altos, Calif.), says Ray Burgess, assistant
general manager of Motorola's consumer groups, which is part of the company's
semiconductor sector. Blackbird emerged from research and development done
with TeleTV, a defunct telephone company and video entertainment consortium.
The phoenix rising from this ill-fated venture could significantly change how
content is distributed. "We got to thinking the media processing technology we
were creating allowed us to create a software-defined network," Burgess says.
Instead of providing the ability to change functions by ramping up on memory
(see "The Chips Are Up for Network Help," November 1997), Blackbird makes
better use of a fairly standard amount of memory. It runs on 8 to 32 megabytes
of RAM and 2 to 16 megabytes of ROM.
The PowerPC CPU runs most of the generic functions, explains Tom Starnes,
the director of the embedded microcomputers for consultancy Dataquest Inc.
(San Jose, Calif.). The Project X CPU, which was designed as a media engine,
performs the value-added processing. "Project X is the sexy thing," Starnes
says. Some of its capabilities include 3-D gaming, videoconferencing, digital
video disc (DVD) processing and high-speed data transmissions.
Blackbird currently exists as a reference design. Customers can insert
motherboards from Motorola in their boxes, have Motorola build boxes with the
customer's brand name on them or simply license the reference design and have
the circuitry built at their own plants, Burgess says. Motorola does not intend to
build its own Blackbird boxes, he says.
Since the processing and media engine functions are partitioned from the
network interface device, Blackbird can be used with many common
architectures, including hybrid fiber/coax (HFC), digital subscriber line (DSL)
and switched digital video (SDV). "It's the first I've seen that truly makes
programming for all possible platforms, whether it be satellite, cable, LMDS or
MMDS," says Will Strauss, president of Forward Concepts Co. (Tempe, Ariz.),
a high-technology market research firm. "It's the closest I've seen to a universal
set-top box." LMDS (local multipoint distribution service) and MMDS
(multichannel multipoint distribution service) are types of cellular voice, video
and data distribution platforms.
The ballpark price for the Blackbird hardware and software will be between
$300 and $700. "It's a lot of horsepower at a very moderate price, and it takes
up a very small space," Strauss says.
How GIC designs a set top
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