WinPath3

Overview

Next Generation Access Processing

WinPath3 along with its enhanced carrier-grade software extends the proven Microsemi product formula of complete protocol solutions to a significantly higher level of performance.

WinPath3 integrates control plane and enhanced data plane processing components. Control plane processing is based on two high performance MIPS 34K multi-threaded processors.

Data plane processing uses new hardware accelerators for packet classification, hierarchical shaping, additional security standards and more which have been added to off-load common processing tasks. These accelerators are flexibly combined with Microsemi's field-proven, fully-programmable, high performance, multi-threaded WinComm multi-core data path processor subsystem. The available number of cores in WinComm has increased from six to twelve along with increases in operating speed.

This third generation of WinPath products builds upon hundreds of successful customer communications system deployments and leverages the broad set of supplied protocols developed for WinPath1 and WinPath2. These protocols include support for L2 and L3 termination (including Ethernet, ML-PPP, IMA, CES), PWE3 (for Ethernet, TDM, HDLC, ATM), Packet Network Synchronization (IEEE 1588v2, Synchronous Ethernet, adaptive and differential clock recovery), interworking (MPLS, IPv4/IPv6 Routing, VLAN-aware bridging), OAM (for Ethernet and ATM), QoS (policing, shaping, per-flow queuing, WRED) and many others.

Microsemi supplies these production hardened protocols with the silicon, with no NRE or royalties.

LTE Access and Transport protocols and WiMAX, which generally require significant OEM and deployment customization, are fully supported by royalty-free source licensing.

Interfaces have been enhanced with on-chip SERDES and the latest memory interfaces for lowered bill-of-materials costs and straightforward system integration.

WinPath3 has been designed for a straightforward upgrade of WinPath2 applications while providing significant capabilities for the next generation of access systems. Building on a base of existing applications yields a minimum of design risk, short time-to-market and lowered cost for new or migrated systems.

Key Features

Third generation family of communication processors provided with carrier-class IP protocol and interworking software
5x the performance and higher integration than second generation WinPath2 family
Extensive set of interfaces support IP up to 10 GbE and TDM/SDH up to OC 48 unchannelized or OC 24 channelized
System bus interfaces including PCIe and dual SRIO
14 integrated SERDES
Highly flexible integrated DDR and Flash memory controllers
Powerful multi-threaded, multi-core acceleration with RAM-based code store supports evolving standards in Wireline (Carrier Ethernet, Enterprise Access, Mobile Backhaul, GPON, DSLAM) and Wireless (LTE, WiMAX, Fixed Wireless Access) systems
Data path software is royalty-free and carrier-class supported with a C-language API for rapid system integration for over 60 protocols.
Available data path software supports networking at Layer 2 and above, interworking, QoS, and protocols such as MPLS, MPLS-TP, PB, PBB, EFM G.Bond, PWE3-SATOP, Link Aggregation, GRE, WRED, WFQ, VLAN-aware bridging and many others
Customer-specific requirements supported by rich suite of development tools and licensing options for source code and / or contracting both Microsemi and third-party developers

RISC Control Processors

Integrated: dual, multi-threaded MIPS 34Kc® cores at 650MHz with individual 64K-I/32K-D caches and a 256-KByte or 512-Kbyte L2 cache for one core

Control processor can be disabled and / or processing can be shared with external core

Data Path Processors

Up to 12 RISC processors and 64 concurrent hardware threads processing at up to 450 MHz

Provides up to 10 Gbps simplex Ethernet based Routing / Bridging application performance for 64-Byte minimum-sized packets, (15M packets per second), including classification, policing and shaping

New Hardware Accelerators

Packet classifier (wire speed classification on all interfaces) with 32K rules, including bridging support with up to 16K forwarding rules; up to 450M classification searches per second
Policing accelerator (supporting dual leaky bucket) for up to 64K flows
3 level hierarchical shaper with 16K Flows with WRED accelerators

Two Security Accelerators (AES, 3xDES , Kasumi, Snow-3G, H-MAC, SHA -1/2, MD5, etc.) with True RNG
Synchronization over packet networks: adaptive, differential, IEEE 1588, Synchronous Ethernet

Bus and Memory Interfaces

3x 16-bit / 32-bit DDR2/3 @1200Mbps per pin, (600 MHz, 1200 MTps)
2.5MB Internal memory
NAND, I2C, and NOR Flash memory support

Asynchronous peripheral bus
One PCIe v1.1 Interface
Two SRIO v1.3 (x1 or x4) Interfaces

WinComm Serial Interfaces:

8 WinNet, supporting combinations of:
16x GbE (SGMII or RGMII or GMII or RTBI)
8x 2.5GbE (Over-clocked SGMII @ 3.125Gbps)
72x ENET 10/100 (SMII /SS -SMII), or 8x RGMII

Two 10GbE MACACs (XAUI interface)

Three UPI supporting:

3x UL2/PL2, 3x/2x SPI3/UL3 (8-/32-bit)

EMPHY (16-/32-bit for connection to UFE FPGA)

16 TDI supporting T1/E1/T3/E3 or CT/MVIP bus

14 multi-standard SERDES lanes

Shared between the SGMII, over-clocked SGMII, XAUI, SRIO and PCIe

Able to directly drive backplane busses

Host Serial Interfaces:

UART, I2C, RMII Management Ethernet Port

Physical:

31mm x 31mm 896 FCBGA with 1mm ball pitch

Low power consumption, 4.5-9.5W nominal, dependent upon configuration

Reference Boards

The WinPath3 family is supported with WDS3 reference boards for early software development while a customer's own board is being developed. WDS3 boards are also valuable for verification of functionality when migrating to new software releases and for duplicating system conditions for support purposes. WDS3 are offered standalone and in standard ATCA form factors, so they can be used with any ATCA chassis. These boards are available with various I/O options and adapter cards to provide equivalent configurations for a range of applications. For more information, contact your Microsemi sales person.

Block Diagrams

System Software

Microsemi offers royalty free, carrier-grade DPS and WDDI system software. The software model consists of the Data Path Software (DPS) that runs on WinComm3, the packet processing engine, and the Applications and Control Path Software (CPS) that runs on the MIPS cores or and external processor connected through PCIe. Between these there is an API, the WinPath Device Driver Interface (WDDI) that enables control of the DPS using a simple set of high level commands. The application developer applies the sophisticated and powerful complex protocol processing resources on WinPath3 by a process of configuration and control through WDDI. Microsemi supports the continuing evolution of networking systems. Upgrades of WDDI and DPS are typically released twice a year with new features and protocols. Microsemi evaluates customer and market input to determine common feature development for these releases. Customers can also modify and / or enhance Microsemi's software through one of two methods: (1) Source code and development tool licenses are available with training and support from Microsemi for customer-develooped code; or (2) customer-directed development from Microsemi or qualified third parties. Microsemi's current software offering includes the protocol listed in the figure below and more. Please consult Microsemi for an evaluation of our ability to meet your system requirements. Please refer to the relevant product briefs for using WinPath3 in your systems.