Introduction

In areas with harsh environments and low population density, significant energy management challenges often arise. In this case, the customer sought a rugged and reliable solution to deliver stable, uninterrupted service across vast regions. Instead of building various physical infrastructures locally, they opted for outdoor server cabinets, providing energy services through a centralized server control system with manageable modules. Ultimately, the Xinming AM5728 solution met the customer's requirements perfectly, thanks to its compact size, high flexibility, and support for remote services.

Challenges and Objectives

Most integrated system architectures face the following situation: the customer integrates IT and OT for real-time data transmission, enabling collaborative operation through process management, requiring accurate information to be delivered to devices at the right time. At the same time, network security must also be ensured.

This demands that equipment operate smoothly under harsh environmental conditions, making it a major challenge to maintain stable and timely service over large areas. Meanwhile, there are no off-the-shelf rugged cluster computing products available on the market for users to develop their required ecosystems, leaving customers facing the following issues:

Limited resources prevent seamless response in managing distributed infrastructure
Business expansion (larger service coverage) makes managing large volumes of equipment difficult
Ensuring long-term support when operating in harsh environments

Solution

The AM5728 core board has passed full screening tests from -40°C to 85°C. Additionally, optional ruggedized SODIMM and pre-assembled design ensure product stability and robustness, effectively withstanding impacts from strong outdoor winds.

The customer selected this product and adopted multiple CPU configurations along with its rugged design in their cluster system development. This not only reduced development costs and accelerated system development but also enabled rapid deployment of platform designs across various systems. Thanks to the high flexibility of COM Express, the customer can choose other COM products under the Basic form factor to meet diverse regional requirements.

Summary

For years, Xinming's embedded boards have been favored by customers, who are highly satisfied with their standardized yet highly flexible designs. This product series is compact, offers excellent computing performance, and features low power consumption, enabling seamless upgrades or retrofits for outdoor workstations.

Module development and customization based on the Xinming XM5728-IDK-V3.

Key Features:

Based on TI AM5728 floating-point dual DSP C66x + dual ARM Cortex-A15 industrial control and high-performance audio/video processor;
Multi-core heterogeneous CPU integrating dual-core Cortex-A15, dual-core C66x floating-point DSP, dual-core PRU-ICSS, dual-core Cortex-M4 IPU, and dual-core GPU; supports OpenCL, OpenMP, and SysLink IPC multi-core development;
Powerful video encoding and decoding capabilities: supports 1×1080P60, 2×720P60, or 4×720P30 hardware video encoding/decoding, and H.265 software decoding;
Supports up to 1×1080P60 full HD video input and 1×LCD + 1×HDMI 1.4a output;
Dual-core PRU-ICSS industrial real-time control subsystem supporting industrial protocols such as EtherCAT, EtherNet/IP, and PROFIBUS;
High-performance GPU with dual-core SGX544 3D accelerator and GC320 2D graphics engine, supporting OpenGL ES 2.0;
Rich peripheral interfaces: integrated dual Gigabit Ethernet, PCIe, GPMC, USB 2.0, UART, SPI, QSPI, SATA 2.0, I2C, DCAN, and other industrial control buses and interfaces; supports high-speed USB 3.0;
Development board exposes V-PORT video interface for flexible connection to video input modules;
Extremely compact size: only 86.5mm × 60.5mm;
Industrial-grade precision B2B connector with 0.5mm pitch—stable, easy to plug/unplug, anti-reverse insertion; critical high-speed data interfaces use high-speed connectors to ensure signal integrity.