Mezzanine Cards on CompactPCI® Serial

2010-12-22, Manfred Schmitz

CompactPCI® Serial – PICMG CPCI-S.0 – is mechanically based on IEC1101, the standard for 19-inch systems and Eurocards. This guarantees that mezzanine modules that have been designed for these boards, and are indirectly based on the IEC1101 standard, are also compatible with CompactPCI® Serial.

The most important types of such mezzanines are PMCs, XMCs and M-Modules™. All of these modules fit on Eurocards. A single Eurocard can accommodate one PMC/XMC or one M-Module™, while a double Eurocard can carry 2 PMCs or XMCs, or 4 M-Modules™.

Because of the connector types used for CompactPCI® Serial, the space usable for components is a little bit smaller than with parallel CompactPCI® and VMEbus boards. This is why for CPCI-S.0 the P1 connector, being the only connector necessary for peripheral boards, was placed at the lower edge of the 3U board. As this connector is only 13 mm wide and a margin of 2.5 mm each is reserved for support rails, this leaves a width of 82 mm that is usable for components. A PMC/XMC with a width of 74.5 mm comfortably fits on the board. Of course, this also goes for an M-Module™ with 53 mm width.

The same is true for double Eurocards – basically. Since 6U boards expand 3U boards at the lower edge, P1 is located quite at the center of the 6U board. This has no importance for PMC/XMC modules. Two of these modules find space on a double Eurocard. A maximum of three M-Modules™ are possible on a 6U board.
The electrical control of mezzanine modules that are based on modern serial interfaces is especially easy. For XMC modules, you only have to connect the right lines and generate the power supply locally. Of course, hot-plug support is possible, too. For modules that are based on older, parallel buses, you need a bridge. PCIe®-to-PCI bridges for PMC modules are available as standard components. For M-Modules™ you will rather choose FPGA-based solutions.

Three aspects played a major role for the definition of the CompactPCI® Serial standard: the usage of the most up-to-date technologies (serial interfaces instead of parallel buses), cost-optimized, robust design, and backwards compatibility to existing solutions. The way PMC and XMC modules can be used in CompactPCI® Serial systems impressively illustrates this.


Peripheral cards for CompactPCI® Serial only need one of six possible connectors and leave enough space for PMC or XMC modules.


Control of common mezzanine types via PCI Express®, PCIe®-to-PCI bridge or FPGA

Manfred Schmitz, Technical Director MEN Mikro Elektronik

German version on ElektronikPraxis: Mezzanin-Karten auf CompactPCI Serial

Other Articles

» The Future is Serial: CompactPCI® Serial (2011-12-23)

» System Slot Boards with the Latest Intel® Architecture for CompactPCI® PlusIO and CompactPCI® Serial (2011-12-09)

» Legacy Interface Concept for CompactPCI® Serial (2011-12-02)

» Ethernet Switch Functionality for CompactPCI® Serial (2011-11-30)

» 6U CompactPCI® Parallel/Serial Hybrid Systems (2011-11-26)

» 6U Backplanes for CompactPCI® Serial (2011-11-23)

» Conductive Cooling with CompactPCI® Serial (2011-11-17)

» Connector Layout and Coding with CompactPCI® Serial (2011-11-02)

» High-Performance Graphics on CompactPCI® Serial (2011-10-21)

» Building Clusters with CompactPCI® Serial (2011-10-15)

» Mixed Doubles: CompactPCI® Serial and CompactPCI® 2.0 (2011-10-13)

» Application-Specific Backplane Architectures with CompactPCI® Serial (2011-09-16)

» Ethernet Extensions for CompactPCI® Serial (2011-09-02)

» CompactPCI® PlusIO and CompactPCI® Serial capture the systems market (2011-08-27)

» CompactPCI® Serial for Safety-Relevant Architectures (2011-08-20)

» CompactPCI® Serial Ethernet Mesh Architecture (2011-08-06)

» CompactPCI® Serial Ethernet Star Architecture (2011-07-23)

» CompactPCI® Serial - Why is it a PICMG Standard? (2011-06-17)

» CompactPCI® Serial Star Topologies, Part 2 (2011-05-12)

» CompactPCI® Serial Star Topologies, Part 1 (2011-03-21)

» CompactPCI® Serial - The Guide Element (2011-03-10)

» Hot-Plug Functionality with CompactPCI® Serial, Part 2 (2011-02-05)

» Hot-Plug Functionality with CompactPCI® Serial, Part 1 (2011-02-03)

» XMC Carrier Board for CompactPCI® Serial (2010-12-23)

» PCI Express® Mini Card Carrier for CompactPCI® Serial (2010-12-21)

» USB Support with CompactPCI® Serial (2010-12-06)

» Physical Addressing with CompactPCI® Serial (2010-11-22)

» Standardized Rear I/O for CompactPCI® Systems Thanks to CompactPCI® PlusIO (2010-11-13)

» Rear I/O with 6U CompactPCI® Serial (2010-11-06)

» P0 Adds Power to CompactPCI® Serial on 6U (2010-10-30)

» CompactPCI® Serial in 6U Format (2010-10-23)

» Ecosystem for CompactPCI® Serial (CPCI-S.0) (2010-10-15)

» First Single-Board Computer according to CompactPCI® Serial Standard (2010-10-14)

» CompactPCI® Serial - a Base Specification (2010-10-08)

» Highly Networked Camera Monitoring System with CompactPCI® PlusIO (2010-10-07)

» Simulation Computer for Training Application with CompactPCI® PlusIO (2010-02-26)

» Recording Image Data from a Mobile Camera with CompactPCI® PlusIO (2010-02-19)

» Mechanics for CompactPCI® Serial: a comparison with familiar architectures such as VPX and MicroTCA (2010-01-29)

» Power Supply for CompactPCI® PlusIO in Accordance with EN 50155 (2010-01-29)

» Harsh Requirements for CompactPCI® PlusIO in Accordance with EN 50155 (2009-12-16)

» CompactPCI® Gets a Plus with an IO and a Serial Companion Specification (2009-12-04)

» Data Management for Mobile Security Application with CompactPCI® PlusIO (2009-12-02)

» Universal Rear I/O Module for CompactPCI® PlusIO (2009-11-19)

» CompactPCI® PlusIO versus MicroTCA (2009-11-13)

» Layout Rules for CompactPCI® PlusIO Boards (2009-11-04)

» User Specific I/O on CompactPCI® PlusIO (2009-10-22)

» Signal integrity on CompactPCI® Serial backplanes (2009-10-15)

» CompactPCI® PlusIO Implementation Rules for Guaranteeing Interoperability (2009-10-08)

» Ethernet Standards for CompactPCI® PlusIO (2009-10-05)

» PCI Express® Configuration Possibilities with CompactPCI® PlusIO (2009-09-23)

» SATA HDD/SSD Shuttle for CompactPCI® Serial Systems (2009-09-10)

» RAID Systems with CompactPCI® Serial (2009-08-24)

» Hybrid backplanes for CompactPCI® and CompactPCI® PlusIO (PICMG 2.30) (2009-07-21)

» Standard Backplanes for CompactPCI® Serial (PICMG CPCI-S.0) (2009-06-19)

» CompactPCI® Serial Rear I/O (2009-06-10)

» CompactPCI® Serial Mesh Architecture (2009-06-03)

» The Star Topology of CompactPCI® Serial und CompactPCI® Plus IO (2009-06-02)

» Standardization of CompactPCI® Serial: what does PICMG bring to the table? (2009-05-14)

» Connector Concept for CompactPCI® Serial (CPCI-S.0) (2009-05-08)

» 3M Ultra Hard Metric (UHM) Connector - The next generation 2mm Hard Metric System (2009-04-27)

» Standard Backplanes for CompactPCI® PlusIO (PICMG 2.30) and CPCI-S.0 (2009-04-02)

» CompactPCI® PlusIO Rear I/O (2009-03-20)

» CompactPCI® Serial and Rear I/O (2009-03-05)

» Migration from CompactPCI® to CompactPCI® Serial (2009-02-20)

» CompactPCI® PlusIO and CompactPCI® Serial System Architecture (2009-02-20)

» CompactPCI® and CompactPCI® Express System Architecture (2009-02-06)

» What is CompactPCI® Serial? (2009-01-14)