ASHBURN, Va., 26 April 2012. Curtiss-Wright Controls Defense Solutions in Ashburn, Va., is introducing the VPX3-1257 3U OpenVPX single-board computer with the quad-core 3rd-Generation Intel Core i7-3612QE processor, which was introduced this week. The embedded computing board is for harsh-environment, air- and conduction-cooled aerospace and defense applications.

The Intel 3rd-Generation Core microprocessor previously was known as Ivy Bridge, and delivers a significantly improved thermal profile, enabling greater cooling for the extended temperature ranges necessary for many military embedded systems such as unmanned aerial and ground vehicles, tactical aircraft, armored vehicles, and rugged naval systems.

The VPX3-1257 has "a thermal footprint never before obtained with earlier generation processors," says Lynn Bamford, senior vice president and general manager of Curtiss-Wright Controls Defense Solutions.

The 3rd Generation Intel Core i7 processor has a reduced power footprint compared to earlier generations of the chip, Intel officials say. The VPX3-1257 is backward-compatible with the Curtiss-Wright VPX3-1256, which based on the Intel Core i7-2715QE processor.

The latest Intel Core i7-3612QE processor not only offers reduced power at a similar clock speed, but also delivers the improved performance per Watt required by size, weight, and power (SWaP)- constrained applications, company officials say.

The board offers on-board I/O, x8 PCI Express Gen2 fabric, and XMC mezzanine module expansion. The VPX3-1257 comes in air- and conduction-cooled configurations. Performance features include 8 to 16 gigabytes of high-bandwidth DDR3 SDRAM (1333 MHz), dual Gigabit Ethernet, USB 2.0 ports, DVI, SATA, and an XMC site supported with eight lane of PCI Express. Software support includes Windows WES7, Linux, and VxWorks.

For more information contact Curtiss-Wright Controls Defense Solutions online at www.cwcdefense.com.

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