Advantech is launching the 4U, dual-node, short-depth (350mm), industrial chassis ACP-4D00, which is designed for high-end machine automation applications that require two computers in one piece of equipment for workload sharing or parallel computing.
The dual node architecture allows the user to install two half-size slot SBCs in two sub-systems and integrate them in a compact 4U cage. Each node supports a CPU card with desktop Core i processor, 6-slot backplane and up to 350W power supply, so the computer node can be used for either traditional control applications or for high end CPU/GPU computing. For example, in an AOI (Automatic Optical Inspection) application, one node can be used for controlling camera, robotic arm movements, capturing image or sensor data, HMI, etc., while the other can be used for processing data and generating inspection results.
By adopting half-size, slot SBC architecture, ACP-4D00 depth is only 350mm, making it easy to integrate into equipment enclosures and leaving more space for air flow, device placement, and cable routing. Tool-less design allows the user to pull out the sub-system, open its top-lid, or take out the system fan just by loosening thumb-screws; no screw driver needed. This facilitates equipment maintenance, and equipment MTTR (Mean Time to Repair) becomes shorter.
Each ACP-4D00 node supports a PICMG 1.3 or PCI half-size CPU card with computing power up to desktop Core i7, 6-slot backplane with maximum 3 PCIe or PCI expansion slots (3 slots are occupied by CPU card) and 250W or 350W high-efficiency 80 Plus power supply. The excellent thermal design ensures that high-end Core i7 processor and discrete GPU card run stably for intense data or image processing tasks.
