With 12, 20, or 24 Gigabit Ethernet (GbE) ports and up to 4x10GbE ports, the VPX6-684 FireBlade II is well-suited for system integrators architecting secure high-performance IPv4/v6 Intra-Platform Networks. The board is the first high-density 6U VPX GbE multilayer switch/router board designed for rugged embedded aerospace and defense applications, according its manufacturer, Curtiss-Wright Controls Embedded Computing. The FireBlade II operates as either a fully managed or an unmanaged switch/router. Support for a "de facto" industry-standard command line interface (CLI) speeds time-to-market by reducing setup, configuration, and maintenance times.
The FireBlade II extends the proven design of its 6U VME predecessor, the SVME/DMV-682 FireBlade, with the high-performance, rugged packaging of the VPX (VITA 46) board architecture. Additional enhancements include support for routing up to 4x10GbE to the FireBlade's P1 connector and support for copper interfaces to the backplane for all of the board's GbE ports. The layer 2/3+ management and configuration software runs on the FireBlade's Freescale 8245 Power Architecture processor.
For increased port flexibility, four of the board's GbE ports can be configured as optical (1000BaseSX). The first generations of the FireBlade will bring the optical ports out the front of the card with either pluggable connectors or with more rugged pig-tail connectors whose optical strands can easily be routed to the back of the card. Future generations of the FireBlade will include direct rear optical routing on the VPX backplane using the P5 and/or P6 connector.
For secure applications, the FireBlade II can be used as a Unified Threat Management router with strong perimeter defense provided by an ICSA-certified firewall. Additional security features supported by the board include Access Control List filtering, Network Address Translation, Virtual Private Network with tunneling support (IPSec/L2TP), IPv6 ESP/AH payloads, and Encryption/Decryption/Authentication support. Contact the company for price and availability information. Check out www.cwcembedded.com.