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Technology Stocks : BLUE WAVE SYSTEMS-BWSI A comer in telecom -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Christopher Brainard who wrote (23)	3/30/1999 9:04:00 AM
From: Liatris Spicata	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 170

I found this product announcement to be a little surprising. Power PC is a chip with a dubious future. I hope BWSI built this with a specific customer's application in mind and good prospects for some orders. ================================================================== Blue Wave Delivers First Quad Processor PowerPC Board For Defense Applications CARROLLTON, Texas--(BUSINESS WIRE)--March 24, 1999--Blue Wave Systems, (Nasdaq/NMS:BWSI - news), has developed its first ever non-DSP based signal processing product, the VME/4100, a quad processor PowerPC board for high-performance defense applications. Ruggedized and conduction cooled, the new board is suitable for use in aircraft weapons control, mission computer, array processing, FLIR and other high-end computing systems. The PowerPC design excels at complex decision-making RISC processor operations with comparable performance in certain applications for processing intensive DSP-type functions, much like a conventional DSP/RISC board combination. Unlike combination systems, the use of a single PowerPC platform provides a unified development environment simplifying system development and reducing board count. ''The adoption of an all PowerPC platform to execute both DSP- and RISC processor-type functions has definite advantages in certain applications,'' said Matt Muzzin, defense product marketing manager for Blue Wave Systems. ''By unifying the VME/4100's development environment, embedded designers no longer have to work with different types of code or tools. Instead, they need only be familiar with industry-standard PowerPC development tools.'' Four superscalar Motorola MPC603r PowerPC processors operating at 200MHz form the engine of the VME/4100. Connecting the processor nodes together is an on-board PCI bus for rapid inter-processor communication and data transfers. For code and data storage, each node has access to local banks of 8Mbytes SDRAM and up to 8Mbytes of Flash. Off-board communications are provided through Fibre Channel, Ethernet and RS-232 serial interfaces. The Fibre Channel I/O supports SCSI FC-AL and lightweight protocols at a sustained transfer rate of 100 Mbytes/sec. A standard Ethernet link permits network connection for software development, debugging and testing and RS-232 interfaces have been provided on each processor node. The VME/4100 is available in three levels of ruggedization. These include: commercial for benign environment usage, extended temperature air cooled for more demanding environments and rugged conduction cooled for extreme temperature, vibration and shock conditions. The fully ruggedized VME/4100 has been designed specifically for airborne and vehicular use. Vibration performance has been validated at 0.12g2/Hz (g squared)(20 to 2000Hz) for 2.5 hours (operational) and thermal cycling is rated at 2000 cycles 100-degrees C delta. All three ruggedization levels are the same design and software compatible, providing a clear migration path from development to deployment. This new PowerPC board is backed by comprehensive software support that includes bootcode, power-up Built-in Test (BIT), boot monitor and a VxWorks OS board support package. The bootcode initializes hardware, while the BIT power-up routine verifies the readiness of the VME/4100 board, checking and reporting on board operational status. In the event of a system failure, the BIT module will enable the board to continue operating in a reduced functionality mode. ''The VME/4100 is an ideal product for today's military applications,'' Muzzin concludes. ''It offers the same levels of versatility, performance and ruggedization found in most DSP/RISC combination boards, but is much easier to develop with.'' Prices range from $12,000 to $18,000 in OEM quantities depending on the level of ruggedization.