From Prototype through Production:

How an AMC DSP Farm Can Simplify and Accelerate Your

Development Efforts

by Danny Frydman, VP R&D, Surf Communication Solutions

April 2006
From Prototype through Production:
How an AMC DSP Farm Can Simplify and Accelerate Your Development Efforts

Introduction
The emergence of ATCA (Advanced Telecom Computing Architecture) and MicroTCA (Micro
Telecom Computing Architecture) platforms, and with them, AMC (Advanced Mezzanine
Card) solutions, represents a new era in which developers of telecom, military, medical and
other processing-intensive applications are able to reduce internal R&D efforts, as well as
manufacturing and operational expenses, by using commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) building
blocks from 3rd party suppliers. This trend is driving a wave of new systems and
architectures for a wide variety of applications: audio and video gateways for 3G, IMS and
other networks, media servers, packet-to-packet applications, session border controllers,
cryptography, lawful interception, and medical image processing, to name a few. Many
equipment manufacturers are entering the prototype stages today in order to define the
systems of tomorrow.

The Design Conflict

The prototype stage is typically characterized by an internal design conflict: how to deal
with high-level system issues without neglecting the detail-level issues necessary to ensure
that the system will meet marketing requirements. This is the stage where a flexible
solution can come in handy.

The Good News

The good news for those seeking such a solution is that it already exists, in
the form of a DSP-based AMC board for ATCA, µTCA or proprietary
systems. Surf Communication Solutions has recently announced a
modular AMC form factor DSP resource board with advanced
media processing capabilities. The RoHS-compliant
SurfRider/AMC™ introduces a patent-pending design
featuring the SurfDocker™ modular plug-in,
which carries up to four pairs of
same/mixed types of DSPs and supports
a variety of configurations to meet the
application developer’s requirements.
This paradigm allows varying types of
DSPs to be assembled simultaneously on a This AMC board holds up to
single AMC carrier. For more four modular plug-ins carrying
information about the SurfRider/AMC, click here. mixed types of DSP pairs.

The Luxury and Benefits of Deferred Decision-Making

The great advantage of selecting such a flexible AMC-based solution is that the same
resource board can be used for all stages in the development cycle, from prototype through
final production, since you can start designing your system without committing to:
ƒ the specific serial interfaces (such as AMC.1,2,3,4) to be used in the final AMC
solution
ƒ the specific type of DSPs to be used in the final system
ƒ the number of DSPs per board needed to achieve the required channel density
ƒ the type(s) of DSP(s) to be integrated on the same board simultaneously

© Surf Communication Solutions, 2006 Page 2 of 3

From Prototype through Production:
How an AMC DSP Farm Can Simplify and Accelerate Your Development Efforts

The Result: Shortened Time-to-Market

This flexibility enables equipment manufacturers, during the critical initial phase of product
design, to focus on the system level issues, such as chassis specifications, blade types,
throughputs and other required capabilities. This type of approach saves valuable research
and development resources, since the detailed design decisions relating to the AMC board
can be modified at any time during the development cycle. As a result, the first prototype
can be achieved quickly, and overall time-to-market will be shortened considerably.

For more information, contact Danny Frydman at danny@surf-com.com.

© Surf Communication Solutions, 2006 Page 3 of 3