Phoenix CSW1 VXS VXS High Speed Serial Communication Zero Latency Switch Card

The Phoenix CSW1 is a VXS switch slot compatible card that enables standard backplanes to be configured with any topology. The Phoenix CSW1 uses ZLS (Zero Latency Switch) technology for maximum flexibility in configuring a VXS system's communications infrastructure. At its heart, the ZLS provides a cross-bar circuit switch that enables any high-speed serial data link to be linked to any other high-speed data link. These serial data links can be VXS backplane connections or front panel (copper or fiber-optic) transceiver I/O. Other modes, such as 'broadcast', are also supported.

VXS Backplane Configuration
The Phoenix CSW1 supports up to 56 VXS 1x (backplane) links (or 14 4x) which can be configured for any routing topology. The actual routing is established using static circuit switches. These link together the VXS payload connections routed by the backplane to the switch slot. The combination of the CSW1 and a standard backplane is to effectively provide a custom backplane routing scheme using off-the-shelf products. Each VXS payload card supports up to 2 4x (8 1x) links, so depending on the VXS backplane employed, the CSW1 can be used to fully connect up to 7 payloads cards with dual 4x links or 14 payload cards with a single 4x link. Thus the CSW1 can support systems ranging from 2 to 14 VXS payload cards using 4x links.

Inter-linked VXS Payload Cards


Front Panel Data I/O
In addition to backplane data link routing, the Phoenix CSW1 supports front panel serial I/O ports with up to 12 transceiver channels. The transceivers can operate at any speed up to 3.2 Gbps depending on the specific transceiver type. These channels can be routed to any of the VXS communications channels for convenient data input/output from sensor arrays or data recorders.


CSW1 can be used to inter-link VXS systems


The Phoenix CSW1 can be provided with any mix of front panel I/O transceivers. These can include single-mode (for greater distance) or multi-mode and ‘pig-tail’ fiber connections suitable for greater ruggedization.

The front panel transceivers can be used to connect racks and systems together in the same way as the CSW1 can interconnect the VXS payload boards. The only difference is that the signals are routed via two circuit switches, but because these have low latency, there is very little impact on overall system performance. This useful mechanism allows for system expansion.

High-speed Serial Communications via the Front Panel


Hardware Data Broadcast
Often, in real-time applications, the ability to multicast data is important. Traditionally this has imposed a large overhead on a data processor within the system, but the Phoenix CSW1 overcomes this by being able to multicast data streams over several channels at once in hardware. This feature allows several processor blocks to perform processing on common data in parallel. An example of this is real-time imaging processing where several processors can search for different features within a video input stream without the need to set up data pipelines. This improves system latency and response times. The universal nature of the CSW1 means that the data streams to be multicast can come from any source - within the system from a VXS board or externally.

Data Multicast from Internal Source



Data Multicast from External Source

Multicast messages are also useful for synchronizing the system operation.

Since the CSW1 can move data to more than one place at the same time, data recorder applications can benefit from data multicast; while the data stream is routed to the rest of the system, a duplicate stream can be sent to the recorder sub-system. Because this happens in parallel, in hardware, there would be no impact on the processor stream and therefore system performance.

Input/Output to Processor Cards
In addition to simply interconnecting processing elements within a VXS system, the CSW1 can be used to establish and route high speed serial communications between peripherals like VXS based I/O cards and other elements within a VXS system.

Directing External I/O using CSW1

Monitoring/Debugging
Data multicast can be useful for debugging systems because the multicast mechanism can be used to monitor the traffic across any link without interfering with it in any way. This, using a simple multicast mode, provides a straightforward way to ‘tap’ into the monitored signals.

Mixed Data Link Speeds
The Phoenix CSW1 does not need to know about data link speeds because of its wide bandwidth I/O. Some data channels can operate at one frequency while others operate at a different frequency. As long as the serial end-points are compatible, the CSW1 can be relied upon to link the data streams. This is particularly useful for using sensor interfaces with different data rates and protocols.

Routing Configuration
The CSW1’s routing topology is set up via an onboard micro-controller. The user interface is provided through an html browser front end running on a remote computer and connected to the CSW1’s controller via an Ethernet port. This provides a convenient interface to set-up and reconfigure the channel routing at any time by using images stored in the CSW1’s FLASH memory. New configurations can be downloaded or set up ‘manually’ through the user interface. The user configuration Ethernet port is provided through the CSW1’s front panel.

As an alternative to using the Ethernet port, an I2C interface is available. This is linked via the backplane and configured by a suitable VXS processor.

Rugged Build Options
The Phoenix CSW1 is available in a number of environmental build options ranging from commercial air cooled to extended temperature rugged air cooled to rugged conduction cooled. This allows the CSW1 to be used alongside other members of the Phoenix family to provide effect solutions for a wide variety of applications.


The Phoenix CSW1 can be used for complex systems incorporating different data speeds, different channel widths, external communications and more

Contact VMETRO for the availability of CSW1 cards fitted with front panel transceivers to match your requirement.