Rodger Hosking, Pentek, Inc.

• VITA 49: Software radio's evolving language

  Rodger Hosking, Pentek, Inc.

  Overwhelming adoption of software radio as a critical technology for real-time embedded systems spurs defense customers to expand its capabilities for the constantly evolving needs of military applications. With numerous vendors in the market, customers are seeking interoper­ability and easy insertion of new technology. However, data protocols, metadata information, and control software have traditionally been vendor-unique, proprietary solutions, capable of meeting the require­ments of any given system, but highly variable, even when delivered by the same vendor. To overcome these inconsistencies, VITA 49 offers standards for implementing these features to boost user confidence in multivendor, open architecture systems, and simplify life cycle support.

• VITA 49 Radio Transport: The new software radio protocol

  

  VRT protocol improves interoperability, maintainability, and upgradability.

  Rodger Hosking, Pentek, Inc.

• New Virtex-7 FPGAs boost software radio performance

  Rodger Hosking, Pentek, Inc.

  Software-Defined Radio system performance looks to improve, thanks to the advanced power reduction, increased DSP engines, improved buffering, and faster interfaces of Xilinx's Virtex-7.