XPe long term availability hardware recomendations?

[Will Cunningham]

Howdy,

I am new to XPe and have been reading through the newsgroups and
experimenting with XPe sp2. I have been asked to put together an
industrial PC that will interface with some hardware controllers. I
am hoping that someone might have a suggestion as to where I could
start looking to find and appropriate PC. One of my main concerns is
that I find something with long term availability that supports 1394a
and 1394b.

The PC will interface with the hardware controllers via the 1394b
interface. We have a software demo and hardware controller simulator
up and running under Xp Pro on an off the shelf system. The
performance of our demo setup is pretty good. The current hope is
that by switching to XPe and leaving out all the unnessicary
components, we should be able to improve the overall system
performance a bit. I realize that XPe isn't a realtime operating
system but I figure the more stuff we can leave out of the image the
better off we will be, particularly the security enhancements. This
will be a closed system not connected to outside networks or the
internet.

The PC system we are using for the demo unit is an XPC Shuttle system
(small form factor mini-atx) intel P4 3.0ghz, 1GB ram, 80GB HD, ATI
video card, ect. We would want something similarly equiped, but
including 1394 and gigabit ethernet and long term availability.

I think we would prefer to have a whole package system, but if we had
to buy the long availablity components and put them together ourselves
I don't think that would be the end of the world. Any suggestions
about where to find something like that?

As a side note, I just wanted to thank all the frequent posters. I
have been reading through thousands of old posts and it has helped
tremendously in getting up to speed on XPe. I appreciate all the time
and energy you guys have spent making this such a good resource.

Thanks!

Will Cunningham

 

[Slobodan Brcin \(eMVP\)]

Hi Will,

I have never seen 1394b cards in my area of residence so I can't speak for hardware itself what would be good for you. (I never
looked for them actually but read from data sheets and it sound nice).

The performance of our demo setup is pretty good. The current hope is
that by switching to XPe and leaving out all the unnessicary
components, we should be able to improve the overall system
performance a bit. I realize that XPe isn't a realtime operating
system but I figure the more stuff we can leave out of the image the
better off we will be, particularly the security enhancements. This
will be a closed system not connected to outside networks or the
internet.

Yes XPe is then right thing for you. By not including many unnecessary components you can make your XPe boot slightly faster than
XPP, you can make anything work on XPe. (Working performances are usually similar). Multiplication of ready image solution is much
easier with XPe, And you can buy it cheaper than XPP
Also you have some EEF's available in XPe that you can find in XPP like EWF.

There are some third-party real-time extensions for XPe but you probably won't need them in most usage scenarios.

Regards,
Slobodan

 

[David D]

Before finishing your email, Mini ITX came first into my mind.
I think that is a good formfactor choice.
Not sure XPe will improve performance over what you can do just by changing
settings in XP Pro.
What sort of volume will you do that makes you want to use XPe instead of
just XP Pro?

David

 

[Desi]

You can look at ITOX motherboards - Their claim to fame is that they
support "Revision controlled" motherboards, and that the churn is less
and the lifespan is greater. I don't know if they produce any of the
SFF formats, however.

The other thing to look for (At least on Intel platforms) is that the
processor should be on the "Embedded processor" list. This provides a
measure of longevity, since they tend to produce those processors for a
far longer timeframe.

 

[Will Cunningham]

Thanks for the info guys, I appreciate it. I don't know if we will
be able to find 1394b on the mobo, that might have to be an add on
card for the short term.

As far as volume goes I think we are looking at 20 or so to get
started ramping up as development continues. I think we are expecting
to do 40-100ish lots as we move forward. The ITX small factor mobo's
are definately cool. We don't technically need it to be small but
that is definately a preferance. The "Embedded processor" is
definately a good tip, I will look for that.

The EWF is definately a feature that makes XPe attractive. I was
hoping that we could improve the working performance a bit as well.
My theory was that removing all the security stuff and some background
processes would help with that. I figured even with the same binaries
having less stuff in there wouldn't make it run slowwer. I also
want to protect against the possibility that we might go from not
needing real time to suddenly needing it as development continues.
With the third party extensions that add real time, we can add real
time if it becomes nessicary.

Thanks again,

Will

 

[Guest]

Look at www.ibase.com.tw. I use the MB870 and its great - but its S478,
surely not the right socket for long term availability. But they also make
Mainboards für Pentium M processors. I think that these CPUs will be
available for at least 3 years. Hope i am not wrong .