ADLINK MXC-2300 Embedded System Deployment Guide

ADLINK MXC-2300 Industrial Fanless Embedded System Selection and Deployment Practical Guide

In harsh environments such as industrial automation, intelligent transportation, and ship automation, the stability, scalability, and environmental adaptability of embedded systems are key to project success. ADLINK's Matrix MXC-2300 series is based on the Intel Atom E3845 quad core processor (Bay Trail platform), providing excellent 3D graphics performance and media acceleration capabilities with extremely low power consumption. With rich I/O interfaces, flexible PCI/PCIe expansion slots, dual isolated CAN buses, and 16 channel isolated digital I/O, it is an ideal choice to replace old industrial computers or upgrade existing control nodes. This article will provide a detailed operation guide for on-site engineers and system integrators from the aspects of system architecture, core interface configuration, expansion card installation, CAN network deployment, SEMA management tool application, and wide temperature environment debugging, to help them quickly complete the entire process from selection to stable operation.

System Overview and Core Advantages

The biggest highlight of the MXC-2300 series is its balanced design of "high integration" and "modular expansion". The whole machine adopts a fanless cooling structure and supports wide temperature operation from -20 ℃ to 70 ℃ (requires industrial grade SSD). The input voltage is 9-32V DC wide voltage, which is very suitable for unstable power supply environments such as car mounted, outdoor cabinets, and ships.

Core hardware specifications:

CPU：Intel Atom E3845， Four core 1.91 GHz, supporting 64 bit instruction set.

Memory: 2 DDR3L SO-DIMM slots, maximum capacity of 8 GB.

Storage: 1 external CF card slot+1 internal mSATA or 2.5 "SATA interface (specific model needs to be confirmed, but not detailed in the datasheet, actual deployment needs to refer to the user manual).

Display output: 1 x DisplayPort+1 x DVI-I, supporting dual independent full HD display.

Network: 2 Intel GbE ports, supporting Teaming (link aggregation) function, achieving network redundancy or load balancing.

USB: 1 x USB 3.0+4 x USB 2.0, suitable for connecting high-speed peripherals and conventional devices.

Serial ports: 2 RS-232/422/485 programmable serial ports (configured through BIOS or jumper) and 2 RS-232 ports, for a total of 4 serial ports.

Expansion slot: Provides flexible combinations of 2 x PCI+1 x PCIe x4 or 3 x PCI (configuration to be selected at the factory), suitable for installing data acquisition cards, motion control cards, image acquisition cards, etc.

Internal expansion: 1 PCIe Mini Card slot+USIM socket, supporting 3G/4G or Wi Fi modules.

The above configuration makes it particularly suitable as a edge computing node to connect a variety of fieldbus devices and perform local data processing.

Expansion slot configuration and selection decision

MXC-2300 offers two expansion options, and users need to specify their requirements when ordering:

Applicable scenarios for slot configuration in the scheme

Option A requires a mixed installation of traditional PCI cards (such as old data acquisition cards) and high bandwidth PCIe cards (such as high-speed image acquisition cards) for 2 x PCI and 1 x PCIe x4

Option B 3 x PCI is fully compatible with a large number of existing PCI control cards, suitable for upgrading old systems and avoiding driver compatibility issues

Deployment suggestion:

If the project is newly developed, priority should be given to option A (PCIe x4 provides higher bandwidth and supports DMA large data transfer).

If two or more PCI cards need to be installed without PCIe, choose option B.

When installing expansion cards, pay attention to physical size limitations (half height/full height, length), and measure the height of the baffle and internal space in advance.

The total power consumption of the system will increase due to the expansion card, so it is necessary to ensure that the power adapter or DC input power is sufficient (the full load power consumption of the whole machine is not given in the datasheet, but it is recommended to use at least 60W power supply).

Dual isolation CAN bus deployment

The MXC-2300 is equipped with a dual CAN controller (PHILIPS SJA1000) that supports independent or bridging modes. It has functions such as bus arbitration, error detection, and automatic resending, making it ideal for connecting multiple CAN nodes such as servo drives, sensors, and PLCs.

Hardware connection:

The CAN interface is usually led out through a 9-pin D-sub or a pluggable terminal (refer to the user manual for details), pay attention to the signal lines (CAN_S, CAN_L) and ground wire.

The isolation voltage is not clear, but "isolated CAN" indicates electrical isolation, which can effectively suppress common mode interference. It is recommended to use twisted pair shielded wires in industrial sites.

Software configuration (Linux/Windows):

To use the SocketCAN subsystem in Linux, it is necessary to load the CAN and sja1000 kernel modules and set the bit rate (such as 125k, 250k, 500k, 1M).