VITA Brings Together Industry Experts to Further VXS and PMC Conduction-Cooled Standards

SCOTTSDALE, AZ., October 1, 2004–VITA, the VMEbus International Trade Association, at its September standards meeting voted to move two working group draft standards into the ANSI (American National Standards Institute) process.

The first draft standard, VITA 41.0, VXS, is the base-level draft standard for the latest enhancement to the VMEbus. VXS specifies a high performance, differential P0 connector that allows the integration of high-speed serial fabrics combined with the real-time/hard deadline performance of the VMEbus. For the first time, this allows a standardized methodology of

integrating high-speed serial data pipes to high-performance VMEbus-based systems. Bob Tufford of Motorola, chair of the VITA 41 working group, commended the group for its effort and

voiced his pleasure with the final result. Bob stated, “Moving VXS into ANSI ballot is the final phase to achieving what will become a recognized world class standard.”

The second draft to be forwarded to ANSI is a revision to an existing standard, ANSI/VITA 20, Conduction Cooling for PMC. Ivan Straznicky of Curtiss Wright Controls, Embedded Computing, and chair of the working group, started the effort to provide a method for dealing with possible

connector fretting. The working group began in January of this year and was able to move the revisions into the ANSI process in only 7 months. “The recommended changes were straight

forward and after discussion and one ballot the working group was able to reach consensus. This change will improve what was already a valuable standard for conduction cooled PMC,”

stated Ivan.

Rex Harvey of Parker-Hannifin is chair of the VITA 50, Liquid Cooling–Best Practices working group. At the meeting, Rex reviewed the goals of this effort and discussed with the members the proper scope for the working group. Rex stated, "I think this effort will provide many benefits for our industry. Ever increasing heat loads are forcing designers to consider new paradigms for the cooling of electronics. This document is intended to give an overview of what cooling methods are available and how they compare with each other in many different ways including overall

cooling capacity."

Shawn Ashley, Naval Surface Warfare Center CRANE, presented ideas for improving electronic module reliability prediction to the VSO membership on Wednesday and hosted a workshop on Thursday afternoon attended by more than 30 people. Shawn said, “We are interested in getting

a wide range of informed input from users and the VSO was a great place to accomplish that.”

About VITA

VITA, the VMEbus International Trade Association, is an incorporated, non-profit organization of vendors and users having a common market interest. Founded in 1984, VITA believes in and

champions open system architectures as opposed to proprietary system architectures. VITA's activities are international in scope. The functions performed by VITA are technical, promotional and user related and are aimed at increasing the total market size, providing vendors additional

market exposure and providing users with timely technical information. Today, VITA's mission includes not only promoting VMEbus, but promoting the very concept of open technology as

embodied in the many standards currently under development within the VITA Standards Organization. Virtually all players in all markets from the smallest to the largest now use the

word "open" in their company and product promotions. The VITA name is now synonymous with open systems.

VITA's continuing goal is to unite manufacturers and users through the acceptance and implementation of open technology standards. For information about VITA membership, or to find out how to obtain VITA specifications, visit the VITA website at www.vita.com or call

VITA headquarters at (480) 837-7486.