RTX ARINC 429 PC104 Card

The RTX PC104-429 card is an ARINC 429 PC104 card, capable of being configured with up to 16 ARINC 429 transmitters, and up to 32 ARINC 429 receivers. It can also be purchased with one ARINC 717 channel. The card can be configured with any combination of transmitters and/or receivers up the the maximum of 32 total channels.

THE TRANSMITTERS
Each transmitter is capable of being individually and independently set to transmit either high speed ARINC 429 (100 Kbps) or low Speed ARINC 429 (12.5 Kbps). Each transmit channel can individually transmit any number of ARINC 429 words at any repetition rate from 0 to 1000 milliseconds. Each transmit channel can be individually setup to automatically transmit parity as either odd, even, or none (for ARINC 575 data).

THE RECEIVERS
Each receiver can be individually and independently setup to receive either high speed ARINC 429 or low speed ARINC 429 data. As the data is received, it is saved along with the received channel number and the time the data was received (with a clock resolution of 1 millisecond). Up to 1000 ARINC 429 words can be buffered internally within the PC104-429 card. This means that the software design for the host computer, need not be required to read each ARINC 429 data word before the next one is received, but can instead be more relaxed in its real-time requirements. When the data is read, the information returned with each ARINC 429 word includes the channel number the data was received from, and the time that the word was received. Each receive channel can individually filter out any or all incoming labels, allowing through only those of interest on a per channel basis. Additionally, each channel can individually have its parity indication show the actual received parity or the result of a parity check.

THE HOST INTERFACE
The interface between the host computer and the PC104-429 card is a set of software routines which take care of the mundane aspects of communication with the hardware itself. The programmer need never interface directly to the hardware, or send archaic control codes to the hardware, but instead communicates to the PC104-429 card through a series of high level functions. The PC104-429 Application Program Interface (API) has been designed for ease of use and easy incorporation into various operating systems. For this purpose, it is provided in source code (C). For Windows users, the API is provided as a DLL/LIB, and a Windows device driver is included.

VORTEX GUI
For those environments which will be executing in Windows environment, The RTX VORTEX Graphical User interface (GUI) provides the ability to utilize the full functionality of this card from within a Windows interface. It can transmit and receive any ARINC 429 data to/from any channel, provide engineering unit conversion, and store received data for later playback and analysis: all in a reasonably priced software package.