Hardware Design concepts

The hardware in each embedded system tailored specially to the application in order to keep the system
costs slow.
In this section you will learn what hardware features common across all embedded system and why there
is so much variation with respect to just about everything else.
All embedded systems contain processor, software&storage place. All contains some type of inputs and
outputs.
For example for microwave oven buttons, temperature probe are inputs. display and radiation are outputs.
Each system must meet a completely different set of requirements. for example if the system have less
Cost then other things(power, reliability) sacrificed in order to meet that goal.
Common design requirements are processing power, memory, development cost, No.of.units, expected
Life time, Reliability.

Processing power
a. The amount of processing power necessary to get the job done. A common way to compare
processing power is MIPS(millions of instructions per second)rating.
b. Higher MIPS processor is more powerful. other feature is register width. embedded system
Built with 8 or 16 bit processors.

Memory
a. The amount of memory required to hold the executable software and the data it manipulates.
b. The amount of memory required can also affect the selection of processor.\
c. The register width of a processor establishes the upper limit of the memory it can access.
(an 8 bit address register can select one of only 256 memory locations)
Developement cost
The cost of hardware and software processes. This is the only accurate measure of system cos t.

Number of units
The trade off between production cost and development cost is effected most by the number of
units expected to be produced and sold.

Expected life time

Hoe long must the system continue to function. This effects all sorts of design decisions from the
from the selection of hardware components to how much the system may cost to develop and
produce.
Reliability
How reliable must the finale product be?
In addition to these general requirements, there are the detailed functional requirements of the system itself.
The below table illustrates therange of values for different design requirements.

Criterion

Low

Medium

Processor

4 or 8 bit

16-bit

32 or 64-bit

Memory

<16KB

64KB to1MB

>1MB

Development cost

<$100,000

$100,000 to

>1,000,000

$1,000,000

High

Production cost

$10

$10 to$1,000

>$1,000

Number of units

<100

100 to 10,000

>10,000

Expected life time

Months

Year

Decades

Reliability

occasionally fail

work reliably

fail proof

Embedded Hardware Design and Development is an integral part of product development. The hardware
design, both mechanical and electronics, is done in parallel with software development..
Embedded System Hardware Design

The hardware design process involves both mechanical design and electronics design. The basic process

starts with conceptual design during the embedded systems design and requirements specification phase.
In this activity the requirements and conceptual design is explored further to ensure suitability for the final
implementation. The following factors need to be considered to ensure that all elements of the design will
come together later.

Bill of materials (BOM) costs

Manufacturing cost

Usability

Durability

Power consumption and battery life if applicable

Design for manufacture

Repair costs for expensive devices

Display visibility

Heat dissipation

Noise

Acoustic quality and properties

Weight

Electronics size and configuration with packaging design

 Hardware Design Process

The hardware design process is as follows:

Node Hardware Requirements specification.

Detailed node architecture and design for electronics in parallel with detailed mechanical design and
packaging concept and initial prototypes.

Part selection, schematic capture, printed circuit board design and layout in parallel with mechanical
prototype refinement.

Prototype assembly and further mechanical refinement.

Prototype bring-up, design verification and testing.

Documentation and support in parallel with automated manufacturing testing and end of line testing.

Mechanical Design

The mechanical design of the system should be based on experience of the mechanical, electronic and

packaging design team. This experience is critical to a high quality final design.
The next critical element in the mechanical design portion of the embedded hardware design and

development is to converge on a single design that meets all of the overall criteria.
By converging on a single approach, the effort of perfecting the design can be focused on a single design.
If there is risk issues associated with the design, these risk items should be resolved early through research

and experimentation..
The electrical and electronics portion of the design must occur in parallel. Both proceed to completion in

parallel.
Issues in either the electrical or physical design can force rework in the other. This is why it is necessary

to eliminate risks early as it will minimize the overall cost.

Electronics Design
From the specifications, the electronics design is undertaken using developers which are as experienced as

the project is difficult. \

Generally though, microcontroller based designs and small microprocessor designs or simpler FPGA

designs do not require most experienced designers.

System Integration
The designers will have periodic meetings to ensure that the two halves of the design are working together

well.
Often with plastic cases, the main concern is getting the connectors exactly aligned with the case and the
case's closing mechanism working well. With metal cases, issues of shorts between the board and the case

can be problematic particularly given that the size of the box generally needs to be a minimum size.
At the end of the integration process, and after the testing process, a gold unit is achieved. It is this gold
unit along with schematics, gerbers, and CAD drawings (complete with final tiny modifications) which are
passed to manufacturing.

 Automated Test

As part of the embedded software design and development, and as part of the embedded hardware design

and development, an automated manufacturing load and test system is created.

In the project plan components of both hardware and software are required. It is even possible that the
parts are delivered to the manufacturer preloaded with firmware.
During manufacturing two tests are still required:

1. A test is required to ensure that the electronics which are assembled into the final device all pass tests to
ensure they are working exactly as the golden unit. This test should be totally automated if possible to
eliminate any costly handling and potential static problems at this phase.
2. A second end of line test is required where the final unit is powered on and tested to ensure that nothing
went wrong between the electronics test and the final assembly. Often this end of line test involves loading
the final software. Again this test should be totally automated to eliminate costly handling.

During this embedded hardware design and development process, problems and issues can forced a

regression to a previous step to correct the problems.

It may involve software design and implementation work as well; however, in this case, a common refrain
is: "well just fix it in software". .

Project Management

The hardware design process can be split many ways. Since it affects the physical device delivered to the

end user, it is best to have client marketing involved to approve the overall and then final approach.
The actual work can be split between client resources and Rowe Bots resources with the management
approach chosen depending on the availability and skill level of the managers.