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HONEYWELL Aerospace Electronic Systems Page 57
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6 SUMMARY
The Mark III CMU is a high-end system which provides the latest in both hardware and software technology,
unequalled in the industry. In addition to the Mark III CMU, Honeywell also manufactures a Mark II CMU,
which is provided for both 724B wiring or 758 wiring, as well as other datalink related products including
cockpit printers, Multi-Input Interactive Display Units (MIDUs); and VHF, HF and SATCOM systems. The
following provides a summary of the Mark III CMU.
Technical Summary
The Mark III CMU is a high end CMU with significant
advancement over all other ACARS / CMU products in the
market today. The Mark III CMU hardware platform has
been designed as a modular avionics platform which can
not only be used as a CMU, but adapted to other future
potential uses. It is a 4 MCU unit, which complies to the
new ARINC 758 CMU characteristic, while providing
flexibility to add in additional functionality in the future to
expand it’s capability to our airline customers. Today’s
ACARS and CMU systems provide processor performance
capabilities in the range of 5 to 50 MIPS (Millions of
Instructions Per Second) and from 1 to 6 Mbytes of Memory.
The Mark III CMU is a much higher end system, and has
greater than 400 MIPs of processing capability and over a
100 Mbytes of memory. Although only a fraction of this
processor and memory capability is used today, this
unprecedented growth capability has been designed into the
unit to ensure the lowest life cycle cost and long term growth capability to our customers. This will be a
significant factor over the next ten to fifteen years, as the use of datalink, such as for Air Traffic Control
communication continues to evolve. Such future processing as the addition of the Aeronautical
Telecommunication Network (ATN)
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, ATC unique applications, and the addition of new communication
protocols will require more and more processor and memory capabilities within the CMU. Much of this new
technology is just now being defined within the industry and will continue to be evolving over the next ten
years. It is because of this evolution, that we have developed this high end platform with such significant
growth capability, providing the lowest risk hardware platform for ensuring such upgrades can be supported
in the unit you purchase today.
The Mark III CMU hardware has also been designed to not only meet the required interfaces as identified in
the new ARINC 758 characteristic, but contains additional interfaces to support potential future growth
options. As an example, The Mark III CMU comes standard with four (4) Ethernet ports. These ports provide
growth capability to support future interfaces, without the need to perform hardware modifications, requiring
software only modifications. The Mark III CMU also includes a UHF modem for future use. Thus, we are well
positioned for such future changes such as the use of Ethernet links for dataloading, or other high speed
interfaces that may be defined by the industry in the future.
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The ATN software is the next generation CMU air to ground and ground-to-ground protocols. The ATN is the
ICAO defined protocols that will be used in the future as ATC communication transitions from voice to datalink.
Honeywell has a unique position relative to the ATN, in that as program manager and one of the primary developers
of the ATN router software (under contract to ATNSI), Honeywell is the only CMU manufacturer involved in the
actual development of this future technology. Thus although the ATN will not be in operational use for at least
several years, Honeywell has the technical expertise to assist our customers as such transition occurs in the future.
Mark III CMU has Over 400 MIPs of
Processing Power and Over 100 Mbytes
of Memory – Designed to Support Long
Term Growth without Hardware
Changes