San Jose, California: The Micrel KSZ84xx family of IEEE 1588v2-enabled Ethernet devices targets industrial Ethernet and power substation automation applications. The devices use the company’s EtherSynch technology, which integrates IEEE 1588v2 distributed synchronisation, Ethernet switching, and precision general-purpose I/O (GPIO) in what Micrel calls a compact package.
The product is currently sampling with volume production expected in the first quarter of 2012.
The KSZ84xx platform supports both centralised and distributed network topologies. Precise Timing Protocol timing modes are provided, including the Transparent Clock (TC) introduced in IEEE 1588v2, along with a range of host interfaces capable of interfacing to a range of CPUs.
The devices include Source Addressing, One-Step TC corrections, and Bypass modes that facilitate both Ring and Linear topologies. By integrating the IEEE 1588 PTPv2 time stamping as close to the physical layer as possible, synchronisation performance under 100 ns has been demonstrated.
The KSZ84xx product family consists of:
- KSZ8463: IEEE 1588v2, three-port switch with MII/RMII interface
- KSX8462: IEEE 1588v2, three-port switch with generic host interface
- KSX8441: IEEE 1588v2, controller with generic host interface
Micrel also will offer a pre-qualified Precise Timing Protocol software stack, which has been integrated with the driver and optimized to exploit the KSZ84xx architecture. Source code is available under license.
Micrel
www.micrel.com