RapidIO Support Silicon Delivers Bus Bridge And Switch Functions

April 28, 2003

RapidIO support silicon delivers bus bridge and switch functions Tundra Semiconductor Corp. is sampling the first chips dedicated to supporting the RapidIO interface, the Tsi400 bus bridge and the Tsi500 multiport bus switch. The Tsi400 connects PCI and PCI-X devices to a RapidIO interface, and the Tsi500 provides four 8-bit full-duplex double-data-rate RapidIO interfaces.

The bus bridge chip performs transaction mapping from PCI or PCI-X buses to RapidIO and vice versa, enabling full application-level transparency. Designers can then integrate legacy PCI-based subsystems into scalable RapidIO systems. The four RapidIO interfaces on the multiport bus switch can each be set to operate at either 250 or 500 MHz, and there is a separate 256-destination ID lookup table for each interface.

Performance monitoring features on each interface let the chip observe data traffic and gather statistics on each interface. These monitoring capabilities let designers optimize system efficiency by highlighting areas that could be improved to enhance traffic flow and other aspects of system performance.

The Tsi400 and Tsi500 cost $39 and $59, respectively, both in lots of 10,000. For details, go to www.tundra.com or call (613) 592-0714.

About the Author

Dave Bursky | Technologist

Dave Bursky, the founder of New Ideas in Communications, a publication website featuring the blog column Chipnastics – the Art and Science of Chip Design. He is also president of PRN Engineering, a technical writing and market consulting company. Prior to these organizations, he spent about a dozen years as a contributing editor to Chip Design magazine. Concurrent with Chip Design, he was also the technical editorial manager at Maxim Integrated Products, and prior to Maxim, Dave spent over 35 years working as an engineer for the U.S. Army Electronics Command and an editor with Electronic Design Magazine.