PCIe low-cost switches for comms and networking

Edited by the Electronicstalk editorial team Apr 4, 2007

New low-cost PCIe switches have eight lanes and eight ports or five lanes and five ports respectively.

New low-cost PCIe switches have eight lanes and eight ports or five lanes and five ports respectively PLX Technology, the leading global supplier of PCI Express (PCIe) I/O interconnect solutions, has introduced eight-port, eight-lane and five-port, five-lane switches.

The two new devices also have low power consumption levels of 0.8W, and are offered in the smallest package at 15 x 15mm - aimed at today's space-constrained PCB real estate.

These low-cost switches represent PCIe standards penetrating the price-sensitive embedded and consumer markets.

The PLX ExpressLane PEX 8509 (eight lanes, eight ports, 1.2W) and PEX 8505 (five lanes, five ports, 0.8W) switches offer feature-rich PCIe connectivity attributes garnered from its third-generation architecture.

This architecture features the company's industry-leading proprietary Cut-Through design that dramatically lowers latency (118ns for the PEX8509, 138ns for the PEX 8505) for maximum switch throughput, three integrated on-chip hot-plug controllers, true peer-to-peer capability, and highly flexible and configurable ports.

"The communications market is rapidly adopting PCI Express for control-plane applications and is expected to continue to broaden", says Chris Kissel, Research Analyst with In-Stat's semiconductor group.

"Because PLX placed its bets early with PCIe development, the company's experience and broad line of products are projected to retain its leadership position".

Although good for control planes in the communications and networking markets, the PEX 8509 and PEX 8505 are also suitable for notebook and docking stations, industrial-control systems, medical imaging, embedded systems, and consumer markets, such as set-top boxes, digital video recorders and multifunction printers.

These switches comply with the PCI-SIG PCI Express Base Specification, Revision 1.1.

"Additional higher-port-count products featuring our third-generation architecture are in development today", says Krishna Mallampati, PLX Senior Product Marketing Manager.

"Furthermore, PLX is determined to be at the forefront in the launch of PCI Express Base 2.0 specification-compliant devices".

The company offers twelve PCIe switches that range in density from three to nine ports and from five to 48 lanes.

Its three PCIe bridges provide PCI, PCI-X and local-bus support.

The PEX 8509 and PEX 8505 are scheduled for sampling in the second quarter of 2007, followed by full production in Q3 2007.

Volume pricing will be US $12 for the PEX 8509 and $8 for the PEX 8505.

All PLX PCIe products are fully supported with a rapid development kit (RDK) family of hardware and Microsoft Vista-ready software tools to accelerate design cycles.