The next step: entertainment on short-haul flights
It's been about 100 years since powered aircraft, and therefore civil aviation, got off the ground. While technological advances have enabled increasingly longer and safer air travel with fewer emissions and less polluting, recent innovations have primarily been aimed at increasing passenger comfort.
According to the visions of the major aircraft manufacturers, by 2050 emissions will be cut in half, aircraft will be much lighter thanks to the use of carbon, glass dome roofs will be possible on aircraft, and holographic elements will be integrated into the cabin design. However, the current starting point seems comparatively modest and is mainly focused on passenger entertainment. Since 2013, when the European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) officially allowed the use of mobile devices on planes, it has opened up a whole range of new possibilities in terms of entertainment for passengers. Now passenger entertainment on smaller planes is well within this range. Because while the added weight of systems and complicated cabling previously made it uneconomical for short- and medium-range flights, wireless networks reduce weight and installation costs considerably, especially now that content can be streamed to the a passenger's mobile device, and in-seat screens are no longer necessary. This includes Internet via Wi-Fi hotspots on planes, as well as popular music charts and the latest Hollywood hits or live TV coverage for sports fans.
Aircraft Embedded Systems: Standard Vs Flexibility
Although such entertainment systems do not count among the safety-critical applications inside an aircraft (that is, as long as they function independently and are not integrated into the aircraft control network), they still have to comply with a considerable number of norms and standards. A basic requirement is that the measurements of their enclosures must comply with ARINC 600 in order to fit into the avionics bays, the place where all the aircraft's electronic devices are installed. The ARINC 600 standard also stipulates that the latest, most robust and most powerful connectors are used. The DO-160G standard describes the test conditions and environmental requirements that must be met for a device to be classified for aircraft use. On the other hand, other ARINC protocols such as ARINC 429, ARINC 717 and, of course, ARINC 664 (better known as AFDX (Avionics Full-Duplex Switched Ethernet), all ensure standardized communication between the individual components. In view of the rapid evolution and progress, developers of modern embedded systems are challenged to devise flexible designs despite the multitude of standards.This is the principle behind a new in-flight entertainment (IFE) server, which is based on the CompactPCI® Serial standard. and is optimized for the high SWAP-C avionics requirements.
Sophisticated concept with standard components
An example of an ARINC 600 compliant server is named MP70S. It offers two hot-pluggable HDD shuttles that can be swapped during operation. Therefore, the cabin crew can exchange data during the flight. This is made possible by a separate maintenance board that contains the internal memory for the operating system, whereas previous solutions typically use a hard drive to store media and the operating system. Which hard drive is used is determined by the amount of content on the airline media. In order to avoid cost or capacity limitations, the IFE server is initially without hard drives. This way customers can decide for themselves how much memory they want to install. Two UMTS modems guarantee uninterrupted Internet access, even above the clouds. The SIM card slots for these modems connect to the maintenance board through the front of the server. This means that the network provider can be easily changed as soon as the signal from the previous one becomes too weak, allowing passengers to check their emails without interruption. Thanks to its sophisticated backplane with robust CompactPCI ® Serial connectors and a separate slot for shuttles and maintenance board, the interior of the server is free of cables. The focus for the integration of the plates was also an optimal thermal connection to be able to achieve its operation in a wide range of temperatures could, through passive cooling. However, there was one exception to the ARINC 600 standard: they do not have the expected notches in the case. This sealed design provides greater protection against dust that avionics bay fans might blow into the case. Being an entertainment server and not a safety-critical component, communication with the aircraft network is currently done through the standard ARINC 429 and ARINC 717 protocols, which are integrated as IP cores on a universal interface card. . This ensures that vital functions are not impaired. In case the application fields need to be expanded, ie used within the critical security network, the incorporation of the necessary AFDX protocol is equally possible as an IP core. Data distribution is especially powerful, via a 16-port Ethernet switch that can utilize the full bandwidth of the hard drives via four Gigabit Ethernet controllers. Wireless transmission to mobile devices is via Wi-Fi or 3G/4G connections.
CompactPCI® Serial – predestined for heaven
When configuring this robust system, only standard products are used, despite being intended for an avionics server, they still offer options for simple upgrades, such as replacing the CPU board with state-of-the-art processor technology. CompactPCI® Serial is modular and robust by design, and its serial data transmission offers sufficient capacity for data-intensive applications. Furthermore, this standard is still more cost effective than widely used aviation standards such as VPX or MicroTCA. The entire system design was achieved by making maximum use of available resources, leading to optimized costs. Because upgrading standard components is easy, these systems can achieve very long life cycles, which is important for long-lasting projects in the aerospace industry. In addition, a PICMG working group is also currently engaged in a
extension of the standard under the title “Space CompactPCI Serial”. Led by renowned aerospace manufacturers such as Airbus Defense & Space and Thales Alenia Space, with MEN as consultant, support for other serial interfaces, requirements for higher availability, troubleshooting and adaptability to changing special environmental conditions are on the order of the day. And if it works in space, it will also work in aviation. Of course, the evolution of aviation was not going to continue advancing. And even if a glass-domed ceiling for stargazing, virtual privacy screens, and travel at supersonic speeds are still in the distant future, technological development in aviation is nonetheless moving in the right direction. And reliable embedded systems that can grow flexibly with changing demands will always play a decisive role.
