ADVA and Brandywine Communications have partnered to provide a defense-grade M-code device with advanced timing, the OSA 5422 grandmaster clock, for military applications. ADVA’s OSA 5422 meets key requirements of military networks by providing advanced positioning, navigation and timing (PNT) capabilities and improved resilience.
ADVA’s OSA 5422 grandmaster clock is integrated with a highly reliable M-code receiver, which meets stringent frequency and phase synchronization needs. The device is equipped with multi-band, multi-constellation GNSS receivers for when M-code is not available. OSA 5422 also has long holdover and precision time protocol backup, which enables it to maintain accurate timing even in the event of M-code disruption.
The OSA 5422 supports legacy interfaces such as BITS and IRIG and features eight field-upgradable 10G bit/s ports and 1G bit/s interfaces. The device is suitable for most demanding military edge applications.
UTStarcom has launched the SyncRing XGM30E precision time protocol (PTP) grandmaster. The SyncRing XGM30E is designed for mobile networks and other applications requiring accurate time and frequency synchronization. It is an addition to the company’s SyncRing line of network synchronization equipment.
The SyncRing XGM30E is an indoor PTP grandmaster offering echo time accuracy of more than ±40 ns, which can meet the stringent timing requirements of demanding applications including 4G and 5G networks. The clock complies with the PTP IEEE 1588-2008 standard, supporting major ITU-T frequency and phase and time profiles.
SyncRing XGM30E supports synchronous Ethernet (SyncE) output on all service interfaces for accurate frequency synchronization, and SyncE input for enhanced time holdover operation during GNSS outages.
The grandmaster includes an indoor rack-mount design and power supply redundancy with AC or DC built-in options and has flexible management options. The SyncRing XGM30E is available now.
How the atom went from data’s worst enemy to its best friend
By David Chandler, product marketing manager, Frequency and Timing Systems business unit, Microchip Technology
GNSS constellations are precise timing systems. (Image: Microchip Technology)
Timing from atomic clocks is now an integral part of data-center operations. The atomic clock time transmitted via Global Position System (GPS) and other Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) networks is synchronizing servers across the globe, and atomic clocks are deployed in individual data centers to preserve synchronization when the transmitted time is not available.
This high level of synchronization is vital to ensure the zettabytes of data collected around the globe every year can be meaningfully stored and used in many applications, whether due to system requirements or to ensure regulatory compliance. The quantum nature of an atom enables the precision time and is a critical part of ensuring that more data at faster speeds will be processed in the future — ironic, as just a few years ago the quantum nature of the atom was seen as the ultimate death of this increase in data processing and speed.
In 1965, Gordon Moore predicted the transistor count on an integrated circuit would double every year. This was eventually revised to doubling every two years. Along with this increase in transistor density came an important increase in speed as well as decreases in cost and power consumption.
It may have been hard in 1965 to imagine there would be any real-world need to have a semiconductor with 50 billion transistors on it in 2021, but as semiconductor technologies kept up with the law, so did application demands. Cell phones, financial trading and DNA mapping are all applications that rely heavily on the number of operations per second a microprocessor can execute, which is closely tied to the transistor count on a chip.
Satirical image of an engineer trying to keep up with Moore’s Law. (Image: Microchip Technology)
The Demise of Moore’s Law
Unfortunately, Moore’s Law is rapidly coming to an end due to a limit imposed by physics. With wafer fabrication now in the sub-10-nm technology nodes, the transistor sizes are only about 10 to 50 times that of a silicon atom. At this scale, the size and quantum properties of atoms and free electrons significantly prohibit further size reduction. In essence, you could think of the atom as the ultimate court that struck down the law.
But while Moore’s Law will come to an end, the thirst for increased processing power will continue to grow. With the advent of the internet of things (IoT), streaming services, social media posts and autonomous self-driving cars, the amount of data generated every day continues to increase exponentially.
In 2021, every day an estimated 2.5 exabytes (2,882,303,761,517,120,000 bytes) was generated. Exabyte databases managing more than 100,000 transactions per second (a transaction consists of multiple operations) are currently in use, and the size of the databases and the transactions per second will continue to grow for the foreseeable future.
Synchronizing the Machines
This explosive growth in the volume of data — coupled with the speed at which the data must be written, read, copied, analyzed, manipulated and backed up — required data-center architects to find a way around the end of Moore’s Law. The architects employed horizontal scaling in a data center with distributed databases, where instead of an entire database residing on one server, the database is distributed over multiple servers in a cluster.
In this configuration, the cluster essentially functions as one giant machine, hence the size and speed of the system now becomes limited by the physical size of a data center rather than by the size of an atom. (Take that, atom!)
Software engineers now make careers writing code that enables horizontal scaling. For all the software to work, however, all the machines must be synchronized. Otherwise it violates a concept called causality.
What is causality? It is easiest to explain through an example. Suppose you have two cameras to record images for a 100-meter dash, each with its own internal clock. The first camera is at the starting blocks. The second camera is at the finish line. Both sensors are continually firing and timestamping each image with the time from their respective clocks.
Clock uncertainty causes issues with causality. In this case, a race officially finished before it started. (Image: Microchip Technology)
To determine the official time of the winning sprinter in the race, the first camera’s images are reviewed for the point in time when the first runner left the block and this time-stamp is subtracted from the time-stamp on the last camera’s image for that runner crossing the finish line.
For this to work, both cameras must be synchronized to an acceptable level of uncertainty. If the synchronization of the clocks is only ±0.05 seconds, you would be unable to determine if someone who was recorded as running 9.6 seconds actually broke the world record of 9.58 seconds. What if they were only synchronized to ±5 seconds from the stadium clock?
Imagine this scenario: Observed from the main stadium clock, a race starts at exactly 12:00:00:00 p.m. The first runner crosses the finish line at 12:00:09:60 p.m. From the perspective of the main stadium clock, the official race time was 9.6 seconds.
But what if the first camera’s clock was exactly 5 seconds fast and the second camera’s clock was exactly 5 seconds slow? The race would officially start at 12:00:05:00 p.m and finish at 12:00:04:60 p.m. The race would officially finish 0.4 seconds before it started, the world record would be shattered, the laws of physics would be broken, and the current record holder would most likely be wrongfully dropped by all his sponsors.
Applying Causality to a Database
The same principle of causality is important in a database. Transactional record updates must appear in the database in the sequential order in which they occurred. If you count on the direct deposit of your paycheck arriving prior to having a direct withdrawal to pay your monthly mortgage, and the bank’s database did not record these in the correct sequence, you will be charged an overdraft fee. On one machine, causality errors are easy to prevent, but on multiple servers, each with its own internal clock, the servers must be synchronized and timestamp every transaction.
To achieve this, one server must act as a reference clock, much like the stadium clock, and it must distribute time to each server in a way that minimizes the time error of each server clock. The uncertainty of each timestamp (±5 seconds in the race) forms a time envelope that is twice the uncertainty of the clock (10 seconds for the race). For a distributed database, the number of nonoverlapping time-envelopes that can fit into a second should be at least on the order of the number of transactions per second expected for the system.
Probability, criticality of causality, and cost of implementation will ultimately all play a role in the final solution, but this relationship is a good starting point. A system with time-stamp uncertainties of ±1 millisecond would have time-envelopes of 2 milliseconds, and a maximum of 500 non-overlapping time-envelopes would fit in one second. This system could support approximately 500 transactions per second.
Where NTP and PTP Fall Short
Time-over-Ethernet technologies known as Network Time Protocol (NTP) and Precision Time Protocol (PTP) are used to synchronize all the servers in a distributed database in a data center. These protocols can ensure a local area network can distribute time with sub-millisecond (NTP) or sub-microsecond (PTP) uncertainties, enabling thousands (NTP) or millions (PTP) of transactions per second.
Unfortunately, even with these solutions that enabled a detour around the atom-imposed demise of Moore’s Law, physics has thrown another roadblock in the path of distributed databases in the form of the speed of light.
Imagine a well-synchronized distributed database operating with PTP in San Jose, California, happily executing 100,000 transactions per second with no causality issues. One of the database architects is sitting in his office in New York and his boss asks him to update a large series of records.
The architect wants to be able to exploit his new database to its full extent and show off the system capabilities. He plans on executing 100,000 transactions per second.
To update records per the request, he creates a simple transaction that adds the value of one record to a second record only if the value of the first record is greater than the second record. To accomplish this, he must issue a read to both records. His local machine in New York will then compare the values, then send a write command to the second record when needed.
After completing this, he then wants to execute the next transaction that compares a third value to the new sum. If the new sum is greater than the third record, then the third record is replaced with the sum. He wants to repeat this for 6 million records. Because the database is capable of 100,000 transactions per second, he thinks it will be done in roughly a minute. He tells his boss he will have the records updated in five minutes, then leaves to get a cup of coffee.
While drinking his coffee, he reads a story about how the new 100-meter dash record is negative 0.4 seconds which defies the laws of physics, and that the previous record holder is suing the stadium officials because he has lost all his endorsement money. The architect laughs to himself and thinks that the stadium should have hired him as the synchronization expert.
He comes back to his desk five minutes later and is dismayed to see that his database update has completed fewer than 1,500 transactions. He sadly realizes his mistake and prepares his résumé to send it over to the stadium, where he hopes his PTP deployment won’t have the same problem.
What went wrong? The speed of light limits the theoretical fastest possible transmission of data between New York and San Jose to 13.7 milliseconds.
The speed of light imposes a theoretical limit to the speed at which data can be transferred between two points. (Image: Microchip Technology)
The Distance Problem
Unfortunately, real world transactions are even slower. Even with a dedicated fiber-optic link between the two locations, the refractive index of the fiber, the real-world path of the fiber and other system issues make this transit time even slower. So just one transmission from New York will take 40 to 50 milliseconds to arrive in San Jose.
However, in this transaction there are four unique operations. There are two read operations, which could happen in parallel, which then have to be sent back to New York. The round trip takes 80 to 100 milliseconds. Then, once both values are compared, a write operation is issued and a write acknowledgement must be sent back indicating the write operation completed before the next transaction can start.
Suddenly, it doesn’t matter that the database can perform 100,000 transaction per second, because the distance is limiting the system to 5 transactions per second. To complete the 6 million transactions, this system would take 13 days, more than enough time for several more cups of coffee and to update a résumé. This delay is referred to as communications latency.
Circumventing Latency
But just like with Moore’s Law, database architects figured out how to circumvent latency. Database replications are created near the users, so they can work with the data without having to send signals across the country.
Periodically, the replications are compared and reconciled to ensure consistency. During the reconciliation process, the transaction time-stamps are used to determine the actual sequence of transactions, and records are sometimes rolled back when there is an irreconcilable difference such as when the transaction time-envelopes overlap. Reducing clock uncertainty reduces the number of irreconcilable differences in replicated instances, as more time-envelopes reduce the probability of overlaps. This results in higher efficiencies and lower probabilities of data corruptions.
But now the timestamping has to be accurate not only within each data center, but also between the data centers, which can be separated by thousands of miles and connected via the cloud. This is a much more difficult task, as it requires an external reference with very low uncertainly that is readily available in both locations.
Down to the Atomic Level
Enter the previous foe of the database architect, the atom. While the atom was busy repealing Moore’s Law, its subatomic particles were busy spinning. The neutrons and protons in the nucleus were rotating, while at the same time the electrons were busy orbiting about the nucleus, while also spinning on their own axes. This is analogous to Earth orbiting around the sun while simultaneously spinning on its axis.
The electrons can spin around their axes clockwise or counterclockwise. Considering there are roughly 7 octillion (7 with 27 zeros after it) atoms in a human, with all the subatomic particles spinning in our bodies, it is amazing we aren’t permanently dizzy. (Note: The subatomic particles aren’t really busy spinning and orbiting, they are really busy giving us probability wave functions and magnetic interactions that would give us results similar to what would happen if they were spinning and orbiting. But if the thought of all the spinning makes you dizzy, trying to comprehend the reality of quantum mechanics will make you positively nauseous.)
Conceptual atoms with nucleus and valence electron with nuclear spin, electron spin and orbital spin. (Image: Microchip Technology)
When microwave radiation at a very specific precise frequency is absorbed by an electron, the direction of spin about the electron axis can be changed. If this happened to Earth, the Sun would suddenly set in the east and rise in the west!
Atomic clocks are machines designed to detect the state of the electron spin, and then change that direction through microwave radiation. The frequency varies depending on the element, the isotope, and the excitation state of the electrons.
Once the machine determines the frequency, known as the hyperfine transition frequency, the period can be determined as the inverse of the frequency, and the number of periods can be counted to determine the elapsed time. The international definition of the second is 9,192,631,770 periods of the radiation required to induce the hyperfine transition of an electron in the outer orbital shell of a cesium atom.
Atomic clocks are the most stable commercially available clocks in the world. An atomic clock the size of a deck of cards called the chip-scale atomic clock (CSAC) will drift 1 millionth of a second in 24 hours, whereas an atomic clock the size of a refrigerator called a hydrogen maser will only drift 10 trillionths of a second in 24 hours. (Coincidentally, 10 trillionths is also about the ratio of the radius of the hydrogen atom to the height of the sprinters in the 100-meter dash and of the now-unemployed data-center architect in New York.)
With the accuracy provided by these atomic clocks, approximately 500,000 to ~50 billion non-overlapping time-envelopes can be provided for a distributed database running in data centers in Tokyo, London, New York, Timbuktu or anywhere else in the world.
The unit second is defined by counting 9,192,631,770 cycles of the cesium hyperfine transmission radiation frequency. (Image: Microchip Technology)
Time for Distribution
How does time get to all the data centers from these atomic clocks? Universal Coordinated Time (UTC) is a global time distributed by satellites, fiber optic networks, and even the internet. UTC itself is derived from a collection of high precision atomic clocks located in national laboratories and timing stations around the world. Contributors to UTC receive a report that provides the UTC time from these clocks and their individual offset from calculated UTC. The labs and other facilities then transmit the time to the world.
The UTC report is published monthly and tells the national labs their miniscule timing offset from UTC during the previous month. Technically, we don’t know precisely what time it was up until a month after the fact. And to make things worse, extra seconds are periodically added to UTC, called leap seconds, which are inserted due to variations in the Earth’s rotation and our relative position to observable stars. While this aligns Earth to the universe, it causes havoc in data centers and 100-meter dashes.
The hyperfine transition frequency produced in a hydrogen maser, 1.420405751 GHz, will cause spin reversal in an electron. (Image: Microchip Technology)
Enter GNSS
Two common methods used by data centers to acquire UTC are via the internet using publicly available NTP time servers and via satellite using GPS or other GNSS networks. While timing through public NTP timeservers over the internet was common during early deployment of distributed databases, inherent performance, traceability and security issues have created the push to move away from this solution.
Even though GPS and other GNSS are typically thought of as positioning and navigation systems, they really are precision timing systems. Position and time at a receiver are determined by the transit time of signals traveling at the speed of light from multiple satellites to the receiver. Ironically, this is another case of a physics principle causing a problem — in this case the speed of light instead of the atom — but also contributing to the solution.
The satellites have their own onboard atomic clocks, which are synchronized to UTC that was transmitted to the satellites from ground stations. Acquiring UTC with this method can provide time uncertainties in the 5-nanosecond range, enabling 100 million time-envelopes per second.
This method is far more reliable and accurate than public NTP servers, and while these signals can be interrupted by such events as solar storms or intentional signal jamming, backup clocks that have been synchronized to the satellite signals when present can be placed in each individual data center to provide the desired uncertainty levels during these interruptions.
The evolution of database transaction rates and the enabling and disabling technologies. (Image: Microchip Technology)
Next Up: Jumping Electrons
As our quest to acquire, store and transact data in the future continues to grow, novel atomic-clock technologies and time transmission systems with lower uncertainties will be needed. Currently, national timing labs are developing atomic clocks that work on the optical transitions that occur when an electron jumps orbital shells. These offer frequency stabilities to a quintillionth of a Hertz and will eventually be used to redefine the unit second.
Signal transmission through dedicated fiber-optic links or airborne lasers are already yielding improved transmission accuracy. With these continued innovations data, the atom and light will continue their complex love-hate relationship to enable ever larger quantities of data processed at ever increasing rates without consistency issues or causality casualties.
TIM Brasil’s partnership with Microchip Technology provides the accuracy needed for high-performance network architectures, enabling more efficient data transmission
Now that it has implemented 5G coverage in all Brazilian state capitals, network operator TIM Brasil has enabled precision time protocol (PTP) in its commercial 5G service.
To accomplish this, TIM has partnered with Microchip Technology, supplier of the TimeProvider 4100 technology, which allows full compatibility and meets the stringent synchronization requirements of 5G mobile network standards.
PTP allows precise synchronization and times that can reach nanoseconds among cellular base stations, with security of the data transmitted, by encryption.
Signal synchronization is essential for a successful 5G consumer experience, ensuring better performance, including reduced latency, more accuracy and better transmission quality.
“The evolution of the 5G offer by the operator does not occur only in the expansion of coverage, but in the possibility of providing the evolution of the service to the consumer,” said Marco Di Costanzo, network director at TIM Brasil. “We want TIM customers to be able to enjoy 5G networks with the best possible experience.”
He added, “We are satisfied with the easiness of management and robustness of the new TimeProvider 4100, perceived during our extensive field trials, and we are confident this is a perfect match for the demanding requirements in our mobile deployments. It’s a robust synchronization platform, with high scalability, capacity and flexibility for future growth needs.”
Tests of the new technology were carried out after TIM’s implementation of 5G networks in Brazilian state capitals, and prove the evolution of the service already used by TIM in its partnership with Microchip for the last 10 years.
The application of the TimeProvider 4100 technology can have a positive impact on the reduction of latency time and can help improve the signal distribution in indoor networks.
“Our TimeProvider 4100 offers a robust solution with the flexibility to deploy in a wide range of environments accommodating standards required for mobile 5G implementations due to its impressive versatility,” said Randy Brudzinski, corporate vice president for Microchip’s Frequency & Time Systems business unit. “The device uniquely provides a 1588 grandmaster supporting these standards with the high-precision, accuracy and reliability requirements needed for leading mobile operators like TIM Brasil.”
Leveraging Orolia’s HATI core in combination with Arista MetaWatch, the integration provides sub-nanosecond timestamping with accurate, precise and reliable timing
The collaboration between Orolia and Arista sets a new standard in time synchronization for FPGA-based network devices with the support of native White Rabbit capabilities to achieve sub-nanosecond time synchronization using optical fibers across multiple points in the network.
This integration is factory-supported in combination with the MetaWatch application in the Arista 7130LB platform, enabling distributed traffic capture with high-resolution timestamping, buffering and de-duplication, to provide advanced network monitoring and detailed network analytics. Deep buffering, time-ordered aggregation and de-duplication reduce the load on downstream packet capture and analysis devices.
“One key feature of this important collaboration is the simplification of the overall network architecture by eliminating coaxial cabling and PPS distribution equipment,” said Francisco Girela, White Rabbit application engineer with Orolia. “This integrated solution eases the adoption of White Rabbit, leading to cost savings, reduced footprint and better scalability.”
White Rabbit is an ultra-accurate IEEE 1588 Precision Time Protocol (PTP) implementation that achieves sub-nanosecond accuracy over optical fiber links. Designed for use in avionics, telecommunications, space, defense and scientific applications, White Rabbit has become the gold standard for time distribution within electronic trading networks.
Arista’s MetaWatch is a powerful FPGA-based network application designed for Arista’s 7130 platform and combines several components of a traditional network monitoring solution into one device, which simplifies network data capture, monitoring and analytics.
“Moving from analog time synchronization to fiber-based White Rabbit will allow our customers to improve their network analytics while improving the overall synchronization accuracy across a large estate,” said David Snowdon, engineering director, Arista. “The combination of MetaWatch and White Rabbit allows for less than a nanosecond of error on any timestamp taken in a wide-area network — a crucial feature for trading firms optimizing their latency, or for exchanges guaranteeing fairness.”
The Orolia White Rabbit Z16. (Photo: Orolia)
Orolia’s WR Z16, a reliable and precise time fan-out solution for White Rabbit distribution on 1G Ethernet-based networks, is a standalone device with 16 SFP connectors that provide sub-nanosecond accuracy over the plug-and-play optical fiber links. The HATI core requires an activation license generated by Orolia to be loaded in the reference WR-Z16 device paired with it to be functional.
New Maxiva GNSS-PTP solution for broadcast and telecom facilities seamlessly connects to second-generation GNSS and other timing sources
GatesAir, specialist in television and radio technology, will soon ship a new timing and signal reference solution for broadcast and telecom facilities, the Maxiva GNSS-PTP.
GatesAir is demonstrating the Maxiva GNSS-PTP at the National Association of Broadcasters 2022 NAB Show, taking place April 23-26 in Las Vegas.
The new Maxiva GNSS-PTP is a standalone one-rack-unit solution with a sophisticated switching algorithm that assures high-precision 10 MHz and 1 PPS reference signals to mission-critical components in the signal chain, including transmitters, networking and studio equipment.
Each GNSS-PTP device feeds up to twelve 10 MHz and 1 PPS references in the technology infrastructure, removing the need to integrate a standalone timing source in each component. This substantially reduces equipment costs and installation timelines while providing a single, yet highly redundant, point of failure for engineers.
Precise timing and frequency generation is assured because of the product’s high level of redundancy, according to GatesAir. The product design includes redundant AC power supplies with built-in battery backup for always-on protection, and diverse timing sources including redundant GNSS receivers.
The GNSS receivers include OCXO temperature control to prevent frequency changes, and support GPS, GLONASS, Galileo, BeiDou and QZSS.
Timing sources also include a hardware-based precision time protocol (PTP) module and an external 10 MHz and 1 PPS reference. Built-in switching control logic ensures reliability and flexibility for selecting the highest priority source as a reference at all times.
Support for PTP v2 adds further reliability and flexibility for customers. Available as a modular option, users can prioritize PTP as a facility’s primary source, or configure PTP as a backup to one of the GNSS receivers. The PTP module can function as a master or slave and, as with the unit’s GNSS receivers, provide reliable timing and frequency reference to 12 external devices.
“GatesAir has strong experience in the area of timing and synchronization for video, audio and telecom networks, and the Maxiva GNSS-PTP represents a major step forward in timing reliability, network redundancy and cost reduction,” said Keyur Parikh, Vice President of Engineering, GatesAir. “Our Intraplex SynchroCast solutions have long provided timing and frequency reference generation to synchronize SFN networks, and the GNSS-PTP product builds upon that capability to provide precision timing to broadcast and telecom networks. Our customers can rest assured that they have a proven solution that will work in any broadcast studio, RF plant and telco facility worldwide with the rock-solid reliability they expect from GatesAir.”
GatesAir has further simplified the user experience with an integrated web interface that allows users to easily and flexibly select frequency bands for each GNSS constellation and configure timing source selection in automatic and manual modes. The user interface also offers useful visual aids, including detailed tracking maps and tables, satellite status and signal quality.
Oxford Technical Services (OxTS) has launched precision time protocol (PTP) master functionality on all of its next-generation inertial navigation systems (INS).
PTP is a network-based time synchronization protocol used to synchronize all clocks throughout a computer network. It is used in many industries, but most notably in finance to synchronize transactions, mobile-phone tower transmissions and subsea acoustic arrays.
Time synchronization
In many commercial organizations, millisecond-level device synchronization as offered with network time protocol (NTP) is sufficient. However, in surveying and automotive testing environments where there is more than one clock source (lidar and inertial navigation systems, or INS, for example), final results can suffer from time drift if millisecond — and not microsecond — synchronization is used.
Time drift becomes relevant as soon as you introduce more than one data acquisition system working in parallel. This is because each system will have its own timing error, and over time this error will grow and create drift.
For surveyors, time drift can negatively impact point clouds by making object recognition difficult, subsequently leading to blurring and double vision.
For automotive engineers, when running campaigns, analysis of events within your data may be misaligned, making the analysis more difficult and/or less efficient.
Stamp out time drift
To stamp out time drift, it is important to use the most accurate clock source available.
A key component of an INS is the GNSS receiver. The GNSS receiver acquires data, including timing information, directly from multiple GNSS constellations (GPS, GLONASS, BeiDou and Galileo). The GNSS receiver, coupled with the inertial measurement unit within the INS, allows users to benefit from the centimeter-level position accuracy that is so important in surveying and automotive testing environments.
These satellite systems house the most accurate time source possible — atomic clocks — meaning that devices connected to a network that includes an INS can take advantage of this time source owing to the GNSS receiver within the INS.
Simpler setup for lidar use
By migrating from a traditional PPS hardware set-up, which involves connecting and wiring multiple cables, to a PTP setup, which is essentially an Ethernet “plug-and-play” solution, users can also make day-to-day use of the equipment simpler and more efficient.
Without PTP – using PPS setup. (Image: OxTS)An example PPS hardware setup with a PTP-enabled network. (Image: OxTS)
This much-improved hardware setup allows surveyors and automotive test engineers to be up and running in a much shorter time frame than previously possible.
Adding value to the automotive industry
The addition of PTP also adds value for automotive users. With cars-under-test incorporating multiple sensors (lidars, cameras, etc.), synchronizing all that data can help support accurate analysis after the test is complete.
OxTS is continuing to develop its PTP solution by working on PTP slave functionality and improving the configuration process, which will provide greater flexibility in typical automotive setups that use data acquisition (DAQ) for larger sensor networks.
Summary
PTP as a time synchronization method is becoming more popular, particularly in the lidar industry, with manufacturers such as Ouster and Hesai enabling PTP on their sensors.
The shorter “time to survey” gives customers a much-enhanced user experience, and the higher quality final output on offer means that many users will demand their sensors are PTP-compatible before considering them for their projects.
Manufacturers of complimentary sensors, such as INS, need to build the capability into their product sets to allow them to be fit for the future.
Various OxTS INS are available to use PTP, including the new xNAV650, the company’s new small, lightweight and affordable INS for applications where payload size and weight matter. Learn more about the xNAV650 INS.
Users can also find out more about OxTS and its range of PTP-enabled devices by visiting its dedicated landing page, OxTS PTP-enabled INS devices.
Microsemi Corporation is offering new hardware and software options for its SyncServer S600 series of time servers and instruments. The enhancements improve time synchronization over enterprise Ethernet networks and supply timing signals for improved military radar operations and satellite uplink communications.
“The SyncServer S600 series provides highly accurate, reliable and secure time for a variety of applications, not the least of which are the extremely precise low phase noise 10-MHz signals used in military radars and satellite uplinks,” said Paul Skoog, senior product line manager at Microsemi. “We’re committed to helping our customers improve the performance of their systems by improving the performance of ours. These high-quality timing signals enable radars to track difficult targets as well as to improve the quality and data throughput of satellite communications systems.”
Enterprise and financial customers also look to the SyncServer S600 series to meet the timing and synchronization needs of their rapidly evolving networks, particularly for compliance purposes such as the European MiFID II directive, which specifies highly stringent time accuracy requirements for stock trading systems.
Also applicable for laboratories and test and measurement companies, this latest release of Microsemi’s S600 hardware and software includes support for the IEEE 1588 multiport, multi-profile Precision Time Protocol (PTP), which allows the S600 to operate as an independent grandmaster clock on each Ethernet port — delivering cost savings and network deployment flexibility to customers. This is coupled with a new 10GbE interface to easily interoperate with a wider variety of network and stock trading topologies.
The newly enhanced SyncServer S600 and S650 can be equipped with two 10 GbE Ethernet small form-factor pluggable (SFP+) ports for customers needing to maximize PTP grandmaster performance in a cost-effective 1 rack unit (1U) chassis.
In addition, the S650 can measure the accuracy of PTP hardware slaves that are synchronized to the S650 grandmaster by way of a new external 1 pulse per second measurement option.
The combination of these devices’ new hardware and software features support Microsemi’s expanding leadership position as a cost-effective enterprise PTP grandmaster provider delivering accurate and reliable time to critical systems.
Microsemi’s SyncServer S600 series meets the time and frequency requirements of multiple vertical markets, particularly the global military radar market, which is estimated to reach $10 billion by 2024 with a compound annual growth rate of 2.6 percent between 2016 and 2024 according to market research firm Variant Market Research.
The firm also identifies how radar in military applications is widely used for air traffic control, early warning detection of missiles, navigation at sea and surveillance of air and ground. The versatile SyncServer S600 series meets the needs of today’s demanding timing requirements and scales to meet the needs of the future.
“If timing is to become mission critical, redundant means of distributing timing information is essential,” according to NIST.
NIST hosted the “Time Distribution Alternatives for the Smart Grid Workshop” at its Gaithersburg, Maryland, campus on March 21. The information gained will inform future NIST, U.S. Department of Energy, national laboratories and private sector technical programs and strategic planning.
The workshop consisted of experts on both electrical power and wide-area time distribution. The experts came from industry, utilities, academia and government.
The findings cover desired future characteristics, targets, challenges and barriers to adoption of time distribution alternatives; and priority R&D areas for time distribution alternatives.
Potential alternatives to wide area distributed time synchronization include Enhanced WWVB (radio signal broadcasting), eLoran (hyperbolic radio navigation) and the IEEE Wide Area Precision Time Protocol (PTP – master slave clock synchronization).
Results of the workshop illustrate the need for alternatives to existing GPS timing systems as well as backup systems and many of the challenges that need to be addressed to develop and implement alternatives. Some of the overarching themes that emerged include the following:
While a number of potential alternative exist, they will require further infrastructure, research and concerted investment to implement and demonstrate their potential to replace, supplement, back up, or fill gaps in existing GPS systems.
Potential alternatives may need to be combined in ensembles to fill gaps, create the needed redundancies, and supplement GPS-based timing.
Future alternatives to GPS will need to have the same or better levels of accuracy, resilience, security, trustworthiness, and availability to supplant existing systems; a diversity of timing distribution systems may be needed (terrestrial, communication-based, wireless, etc.).
Dependency on space-based systems is currently strong due to their perceived reliability; there is limited awareness of the possible adverse impacts of timing failure events in such systems (and few backups exist).
Developing and using existing alternatives and new technologies, and integrating these with legacy systems will require standards and use cases to enable new technology, architectures, and interoperability among systems.
Better understanding of attack and failure threat modes is needed to estimate and demonstrate the true consequences of timing failures in systems based entirely on GPS.
Schweitzer Engineering Laboratories, Inc. (SEL) has added support for the Precision Time Protocol (PTP) to its SEL-2488 Satellite-Synchronized Network Clock. In a single clock, users can now synchronize end devices with sub-microsecond accuracy using demodulated IRIG-B and/or PTP. The SEL-2488 can meet all the timing needs of industrial and utility applications.
The SEL-2488 offers security features, including Satellite Signal Verification in which the clock uses two satellite constellations to validate time signals, providing a layer of protection from GPS spoofing attacks. For fault tolerance, customers can opt for a second, redundant hot-swappable power supply, which can be connected to a second power input source. If GPS is lost, the clock switches to a standard TCXO holdover with 36-microsecond-per-day accuracy or an optional OCXO holdover with 5 microsecond average accuracy. The clock operates over a wide temperature range of –40° to +85°C (–40° to +185°F) and is backed by SEL’s 10-year, no-questions-asked worldwide warranty.
In addition to providing IRIG-B and NTP outputs, the SEL-2488 can now serve as a PTP grandmaster clock, supporting both the default profile (IEEE 1588-2008) and the power system profile (IEEE C37.238). The SEL-2488 is capable of synchronizing time for up to four independent networks with a time-stamp accuracy of 100 nanoseconds. Existing users of the SEL-2488 can purchase this as a firmware upgrade.
“Now there’s a choice,” said Shankar Achanta, R&D manager for precise time and wireless networks at SEL. “You can use different timing protocols based on your infrastructure and application needs. The SEL-2488 is the one network clock that can meet all our customers’ timing needs.”
The SEL-2488 was first released in September 2014. SEL included several security features such as Syslog, the Ethernet standard for event messaging, which allows the SEL-2488 to integrate smoothly into a customer’s existing event system; role-based accounts and Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP) for user authentication; and a secure HTTPS web interface, which provides a graphical SkyView display for troubleshooting signal or antenna issues. The SEL-2488 also meets and exceeds IEEE 1613 Class 1, an electric transient and interference standard for communications products.
Designed, tested and manufactured in Pullman, Wash., a standard SEL-2488 configuration, including a dual-constellation, high-gain GNSS antenna, retails for $2,700. The PTP firmware upgrade option for existing users costs $1,750. To learn more about the PTP enhancement in the SEL-2488, visit www.selinc.com/p222.
