Introduction | Systems Applications | Reference Designs | Press Releases |
Reference Designs
Complete reference designs are available for various purposes. The process toward certification by the WiMAX Forum is underway for the full-system version. This reference design includes all the software and hardware required for a cost-effective system solution.
Reference Design Hardware Platforms
Several hardware platforms are available with the performing chip, software, and system verification. The reference board evaluation system for subscriber stations (Figure 2) can be configured to support either TDD or HDX FDD, depending on the radio selection. The simplified base station evaluation system (Figure 3) provides an example of a full duplex FDD implementation using an external processor.
The key features of the evaluation boards include:
- RF port interface for third-party radio
- Radio module
- Network interface
- On-board memory
- On-board control using SPI, I2C, and GPIO
- Debug port interfaces
- RS232C interface port
- External power supply interface
Reference Design Software Platforms
Major features of the Fujitsu 802.16 software platform include the following:
- Compliance with the IEEE 802.16-2004 standard specification
- MAC security sub-layer for subscriber station authentication and data encryption
- Multiple service class support to differentiate service quality
- Dynamic service management to activate service class when needed
- MAC portability to different RTOSes
The typical 802.16 software platform available from Fujitsu contains the following components:
- Host software (which runs on either the on-chip ARM9 or external processor) with the following sub-components:
- Board support packages (BSPs) for popular operating systems
- RTOS wrapper
- Device drivers, such as Ethernet, IIC, SPI, and UART
- Base station or subscriber station management and application
- 802.16 upper layer MAC
- 802.16 PHY service access point and lower layer MAC (PSAP/LMAC) firmware (which runs on the on-chip ARC processor)
As shown in an overview of Fujitsu’s software platform, the 802.16 upper layer MAC accesses the OFDM PHY through PSAP/LMAC firmware running on the onchip ARCtangent core. In addition to providing PHY access primitives, the PSAP/LMAC firmware includes some 802.16 lower layer MAC functionality to offload tasks from the upper layer MAC. This functionality includes encryption/decryption engines and a CRC checker/inserter.
Fujitsu provides the BSP and device drivers for the supported operating systems, as well as the RTOS wrapper, thus simplifying the porting of the complete software suite to any operating system supported by Fujitsu. Fujitsu’s 802.16 upper layer MAC can also be replaced with a third-party component. Fujitsu provides the full API and interface specifications to enable third parties to develop upper layer MAC components. Fujitsu also provides the PSAP/LMAC firmware for base station and subscriber station applications. The upper layer MAC, coupled with the PSAP/LMAC firmware, make up the complete 802.16 protocol stack.
Certification and Compliance
Fujitsu has designed the MB87M3400 wireless MAN SoC to comply with the IEEE 802.16-2004 standard and intends to certify systems according to WiMAX profiles.
