Embedded Systems Design - Europe - August/September 2007 - (Page 39)

boards Mini-ITX, developed by VIA Technologies, is another motherboard form factor. With similar advantages to ATX, Mini-ITX is signiﬁcantly smaller, measuring in at 170 by 170 mm, as seen in Figure 3. Because of its small dimensions, it’s become the popular embedded computing choice for consumer devices with compact housings. The Mini-ITX form factor, originally developed by VIA, can be passively cooled due to their low power consumption, which makes them useful for kiosks, gaming, video security, and digital entertainment devices. Embedded systems developers will continue to be plagued with competitive pressures to provide more features and improved platform-management capabilities. This often requires tradeoffs between performance, space, and power. To further complicate matters, they’re often faced with shrinking form factors, eliminating the option to increase footprint to make room for more power or performance. The good news is that advances and availability of solid multicore processing platforms have proven to offer higher compute performance, sources to handle intensive tasks in parallel, which provides a noticeable improvement to multitasking. Thanks to this parallel concept (which was previously available only on expensive parallel computers), dual-core processors make it possible to distribute tasks to several computer units, thereby duplicating performance. The power dissipation of a dual-core processor is virtually unchanged in comparison to the traditional parallel computer. Today, multicore processing is being integrated into a number of standards-based modular, off-the-shelf form factors for embedded applications. While the current generation consists of dual-core processors, multicore processors are the goal as technology shrinks and there’s more real-estate available on the die. Quad processors are only the beginning. Chipmakers will continue to push for greater performance, using a combination of improvements in circuitry and more advanced manufacturing technologies. Christine Van De Graaf (Christine.vandegraaf@us.kontron.com) is the product marketing manager for Kontron America’s Embedded Modules Division. reduced chip count, and a lower billof-materials, with drastically reduced power consumption. Intel’s multicore architecture provides a powerful and power-efﬁcient platform that delivers increased performance-per-watt to provide greater processing in a smaller area, while reducing the associated costs and risks of implementing new technologies. Because dual-core processors provide two complete execution cores instead of one, each core has an independent interface to the front-side bus as well as its own cache. This allows the operating system with sufﬁcient re- 036-037-038-039_ESDE.indd 39 3/09/07 17:00:35 http://www.syslogic.com http://www.syslogic.com

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Embedded Systems Design - Europe - August/September 2007

Contents News Cover Feature: Annual Study Uncovers the Embedded Market DSP Serves the Convergence Needs of Small Business Embedded Test Offers Unique Value for Serial I/O The Software Detective: First-Fault Data Capture Boards May Shrink But Performance Doesn't New Products Advertising Contacts

Embedded Systems Design - Europe - August/September 2007

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