Building a 3 port 100Mbps IsoGrid switch using an xCORE-200 XL216-512-TQ128

[phasemage]

CrowdSwitch is a future hardware product built using the IsoGrid protocol. When wired together they form a streaming, scalable, mesh network.
Our initial plan is to give low cost (or free) CrowdSwitches to low income residents of extremely high-density urban communities. The best funding model still isn't clear, but we intend to build it within a 501(c)(3) organization to make our altruistic motives super clear.

• 4-port auto-configuring switch
  • 3x RJ45 ~100 Mbps full-duplex ethernet PHY with 1ms worst-case switching latency
  • 1x internal SPI connection to an onboard SoC with 8ms worst-case switching latency
• The core of the switch is an xCORE-200 XL216-512-TQ128
• Onboard SoC with ~512MB of RAM, ~4GB of flash, and able to create a wireless hotspot
• Target (bulk) BOM cost is ~$20.

The Wi-Fi part will be able to work in one of two modes:

1. Providing Internet access to a user
2. Connecting to a regular Wi-Fi Internet access point

The IsoGrid formed by the interconnected mesh of CrowdSwitches provides a redundant multi-path backbone to connect nodes operating in Mode #1 to nodes operating in Mode #2.

I've open-sourced the code for the switch at: http://github.com/isogrid/isoswitch

[andrew]

This is really cool. Thanks

[FrederickH]

This test link is really cool. Thanks

Great project, I hope you succeed. Have you considered Kickstarter for funding, Phasemage?

[phasemage]

Yes, I've considered Kickstarter. I want to have something functional first :-)

[phasemage]

I'm happy to announce that the CrowdSwitch's hardware design files are now open source. See https://github.com/IsoGrid/IsoSwitch.

The main change to the HW design is that the XMOS IsoSwitch is now fully driven (including a per-boot firmware download) by an external SoC via Ethernet (rather than an onboard SoC via SPI). This allows more flexibility in HW selection and means I can get started building a prototype CrowdSwitch earlier because I don't need to worry about choosing the perfect SoC. Another change is to include an xSYS 3.0 header on the board to allow flashing the XMOS chip's OTP with a bootloader that can load the FW from the SoC via Ethernet. xSYS also allows JTAG debugging :-)

I've completed component selection, HW schematics, and a proposed PCB Layout. Much of the design was lifted from the slice kit examples. My work is all done in KiCad. If anyone has a chance to review these, I'd be super thankful! Again, it's all at: https://github.com/IsoGrid/IsoSwitch. If KiCad isn't for you, let me know and I'll try to figure out how to deliver your preferred format.

I'm also looking for any advice on how to go about procuring parts and who I should look into for PCB and PCBA. I'm currently thinking of going with Seeed Studio for a batch of 5 prototype fully assembled PCBA and doing the SW bring-up work myself.

[mon2]

Hello and thanks for this project. Would you please post the bom, schematics and pcb layout in pdf format for easier viewing? Thanks.

Downloading KICAD now so probably can ignore but pdf format is a quick fix to view your project details.

[phasemage]

I couldn't figure out a nice way to export the PCB layout to PDF without losing most of the info. But I've included what I could in the following zip: http://isogrid.org/blob/CrowdSwitchHW_Design_0v5.zip