Vecow ECX-3000 rugged embedded computer

Impulse Embedded is making available the ECX-3000 series from Vecow, a fanless embedded system powered by the latest range of Intel 12th Generation Core ‘Alder Lake’ processors.

Featuring a range of new technologies, enhanced graphics and high speed I/O the ECX-3000 series is intended for IoT, machine vision, in-vehicle computing, public safety and Edge AI applications.

The 12th Generation Intel Core processor family is Intel’s first to contain two different cores in a single chip design. With up to 8 performance cores and 8 efficient cores the Alder Lake offers users a new intelligent workload optimisation feature called Thread Director.

Thread Director is used to manage resources at a processor level with assigning correct tasks. Low power background processes can be managed by “Efficient” cores leaving “Performance” cores free and available for heavy lifting when needed. This processor optimisation is intended for AI and Edge applications where there is a need for the system to be running all the time doing low level monitoring and reporting, whilst occasionally needing to react to an event with a process heavy workload as quickly as possible.

In addition the Alder Lake CPU features Intel UHD 770 graphics, an integrated Graphics Processing Unit (GPU) built around Intel Xe graphics featuring up to 32 execution units which can be used to accelerate neural networks in object identification, processing, and other Edge AI tasks.

The ECX-3000 includes high speed I/O with new features such as six 10Gbps USB3.2 Gen 2 ports and up to eight 2.5GbE Ethernet ports with two models (ECX-3071XRT/XFR) supporting even faster 10GbE LAN speeds.

Every system has at least one 2.5GbE Ethernet port that supports TSN (Time Sensitive Networking), allowing critical information to be transmitted in real-time. Moreover, there are options for up to four 2.5GbE PoE+ ports offering 25.5W/48V per port power for the latest IP cameras and other PoE powered devices.

In addition to its high-speed I/O options, all ECX-3000 models come with one M.2 3042/3052 B-key socket suitable for 5G modules, one M.2 2230 E-key socket plus one miniPCIe slot for expansion modules. Quad display output support comes via two DisplayPort, one HDMI and one DVI-I interface.

For storage there are two SATA III ports, one mSATA connector and one M.2. 2280 M-key (PCIe x4) socket with some models offering easy front access removable storage.

Impulse is able to fully configure the ECX-3000 to customer’s exact specification in their UK based engineering facility and can offer a wide choice of processor, memory, storage, peripheral card and operating systems.