ARM9 CPU module for industrial and automotive graphics applications

Customer

A group companies specialized in trucks transport and manufacturing of special-purpose equipment, auxiliary units and attachments for trucks.

Objective

Develop an onboard computer for managing, controlling and diagnosing auxiliary equipment. The device is to be installed inside trucks or special-purpose vehicles.

Solution

The customer wants the computer screen to display not only data from the vehicle's onboard network but also images from the two video cameras mounted on the attachments.

After doing research as required by the customer, Promwad engineers selected Fujitsu's 320-MHz MB86R01 processor as the core processor of the computing system.

Fujitsu is a world leading manufacturer of graphic controllers for industrial and automotive electronics. Fujitsu's graphic controllers have the following characteristics:

• Temperature range: -40...+85°C or -40...+105°C
• Active cooling is not needed
• Extensive experience in IC manufacturing at its own facilities throughout the life cycle of a motor vehicle
• On-chip automotive communication interfaces for accessing in-vehicle networks
• A broad range of controllers: both graphic processors (GPU) and system-on-chip (SoC)
• Support of several independent graphic layers
• Support of dual or triple graphic display output
• Support of independent video input

A core member of the Jade family of processors, the Fujitsu MB86R01 graphic controller incorporates a Fujitsu graphic core and the ARM926EJ-S CPU core. The controller has the following characteristics:

• SOC ARM9 320MHz + graphic core
• BGA-484
• Two independent video inputs
• Two independent display video outputs
• Support of resolutions from 320x240 to 1024x768
• Six graphics rendering layers
• 2D/3D-acceleration
• CAN, MediaLB
• PATA, SD-card, ADC, PWM, I2S, UARTs, SPIs, GPIOs

The company has developed Promwad Automotive Jade — a software and hardware system to be used as the central processing and indication module for developing onboard systems for display, control and diagnostics. The system consists of a 100-mm x 58-mm processor module with two 100-pin connectors (pitch 0.8 mm) for main interfacing board (daughter board):

Specifications of the processing module

Software

The processing module uses Linux and also the OpenEmbedded system for building OS image and managing software. Users are thus able to customize the preinstalled packages with great precision and quickly add the necessary functions offered by the more than 1000 applications and libraries within the OpenEmbedded distribution package.

A priority was given during the development stage to demo applications and examples of designing various graphic interfaces.

Apart from the development kit (cross-compiler, debugger and other components of the GNU Toolchain), the client has been provided with:

• The Eclipse IDE with OpenEmbedded support plugins
• Customized and configured demo applications
• Guide for updating firmware and software manually

Development results and advantages of the new device

• Promwad Automotive Jade is a modern technology platform that greatly speeds up the development of complex onboard automotive software and allows the engineers to focus on the critical system components
• The new software and hardware system already features the most complex components — electronic BGA components for the processor and memory, a high-speed data bus, an operating system, a development kit and examples of graphic interfaces
• The client has received the full design documentation for manufacturing the processing module
• Independence from outside suppliers of onboard computers has been ensured, equipment costs have been minimized and a competitive advantage has been gained

Download PDF - 278Kb