Real-Time FPGA Processing Module for ISR Launched

Curtiss-Wright’s Defense Solutions Division has introduced the CHAMP-FX7 (VPX6-476), the company’s highest-performance user-programmable real-time processing module. Ideal for UAV (unmanned aerial vehicle) and unmanned systems intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) system architectures, the CHAMP-FX7 is designed to ingest extremely large quantities of digital sensor data over optical fibers for wide bandwidth, latency-sensitive parallel signal processing applications. With unprecedented amounts of on-board fast fiber optic and backplane connectivity, the module takes user programmability and functionality to the next level.

The rugged 6U OpenVPX board features dual AMD Versal Premium ASoC (Adaptive System on Chip) FPGA devices that add many advanced on-chip features not found on traditional FPGAs. Supporting a range of Versal Premium devices, each device features advanced high-speed I/O and digital signal processing (DSP). The devices speed internal data traffic with a unique low-latency deterministic Network-on-Chip (NoC) architecture that far exceeds the performance of the previous generation of AMD UltraScale+ FPGA boards.

The CHAMP-FX7 Adaptive SoC devices, which support up to 64 lanes of VITA 66.5 fiber optic connectivity directly to the backplane and are rated at up to 28 Gbps/lane, support the most demanding deployable EW, Radar and SIGINT applications. Designed to deliver ultra high-speed processing of digitized sensor data, the CHAMP-FX7 features quad 100 Gigabit Ethernet (GbE) ports on the VPX Data Plane, dual 10 GbE TSN-capable Control Plane interfaces, and 32 flexible lanes of PCIe Gen 4 connectivity on the Expansion Plane.

The CHAMP-FX7 module joins the recently announced CHAMP-XD4 Xeon D-2700 Processing module as the first 6U members of Curtiss-Wright’s new Fabric100 family of SOSA-aligned processing engines. This extremely high-performance board-set delivers a powerful, closely coupled solution specifically designed for the most compute demanding DSP applications, such as EW, Multi-mode Radar, SAR, SIGINT and EO/IR.

Aligned with the SOSA Technical Standard, the rugged CHAMP-FX7 module is available in a conduction-cooled 6U VPX form factor with two-level maintenance covers. The module also supports alternate cooling mechanisms such as air flow-through (AFT) and liquid flow-through (LFT).

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