Arrow has worked with Altera, Freescale and other partners in the Ethernet Powerlink Standardisation Group (EPSG) on the introduction of a Powerlink evaluation kit.
Ethernet Powerlink is an open standard in accordance with IEEE 802.3 for real-time data transmission in automation systems.
Important components are a PLC (master) and devices for connection during the production process, such as I/O modules, sensors, actuators and motors (slaves).
The board for the Powerlink master is based on the i.MX515 Multimedia Application Processor with ARM Cortex A8 technology from Freescale.
Data exchange is controlled by the Powerlink stack. A software image for Linux with a Powerlink master driver is also included.
The heart of the solution for the Powerlink slave is BeMicro real-time Ethernet (RTE), hardware developed by Arrow and Altera for testing SOPC technology.
This is the third version of the ‘plug--and play’ USB stick, following on from the BeMicro SDK, which was launched in 2010.
The board’s equipment includes an FPGA design, software and corresponding documentation. The xKit contains two BeMicro RTE sticks.