Competitive Real Time Virtualization products have some major disadvantages compared to KUKA’s Real-Time products.
A: The KUKA solution can run on processors with or without hardware virtualization (Intel Virtualization Technology, VT) to run Microsoft Windows alongside another RTOS.
Intel processors with the actual wide spread LGA 775 socket supporting VT cost about $100 more than processors without VT support.
For example, the following Intel processors are supported by the KUKA RTOSWin product family:
E1500 (bulk 1k estimated Price $53)
E2160 (bulk 1k estimated Price $64)
E5300 (bulk 1k estimated Price $74)
Intel processors with VT support are supported as well, but they cost much more, e.g.:
E8400 (bulk 1k estimated Price $163)
E6400 (bulk 1k estimated Price $183)
The situation for the Intel ATOM platform is quite similar, processors without VT:
Z510 (bulk 1k estimated Price $20)
N270 (bulk 1k estimated Price $44)
Intel VT is only supported on the Z530 (bulk 1k estimated Price $70)
B: The RTOSWin product family may optionally run the RTOS on one single core.
The KUKA solution is the only one on the market that provide the option to run the RTOS and Windows on the same CPU core as well as on different cores.
Running it on a shared core one will get the following advantages:
- More power for Windows on multi-core CPUs (e.g. for image processing systems)
- Provide scalable systems where depending on the RTOS performance Windows may or may not run the the same CPU core.
Another point is that on CPUs that support Hyperthreading (e.g. Intel Atom N270) it is not reasonable to run the RTOS on a separate core.
As there is no real separate core the usage of HT usually leads to unacceptable latencies and extreme jitter values on the RTOS.
The better solution here is to turn hyperthreading off to get better latencies and lower jitter values.
C: When Windows is running there are no restrictions using the KUKA real-time technology.
Many virtualization solutions run Windows under a restricted environment.
This may lead to several restrictions like:
- Under Windows there's no ACPI functionality available
- Windows cannot run on more than one CPU core
- Windows will run with reduced performance
- The Windows processor microcode update driver cannot be loaded, important processor microcode update may not have be installed then
D: High quality: the technology is long-term proven, a very big effort is made for quality assurance.
Since more than 10 years KUKA is using this technology in their own robot control systems.
Today almost 100.000 systems are running world-wide, the best prove for safeness and robustness of the technology!
Highly automated test scenarios on more than 40 different PC test systems are made - this type of quality assurance guarantees a high quality product.
A: The KUKA solution can run on processors with or without hardware virtualization (Intel Virtualization Technology, VT) to run Microsoft Windows alongside another RTOS.
Intel processors with the actual wide spread LGA 775 socket supporting VT cost about $100 more than processors without VT support.
For example, the following Intel processors are supported by the KUKA RTOSWin product family:
E1500 (bulk 1k estimated Price $53)
E2160 (bulk 1k estimated Price $64)
E5300 (bulk 1k estimated Price $74)
Intel processors with VT support are supported as well, but they cost much more, e.g.:
E8400 (bulk 1k estimated Price $163)
E6400 (bulk 1k estimated Price $183)
The situation for the Intel ATOM platform is quite similar, processors without VT:
Z510 (bulk 1k estimated Price $20)
N270 (bulk 1k estimated Price $44)
Intel VT is only supported on the Z530 (bulk 1k estimated Price $70)
B: The RTOSWin product family may optionally run the RTOS on one single core.
The KUKA solution is the only one on the market that provide the option to run the RTOS and Windows on the same CPU core as well as on different cores.
Running it on a shared core one will get the following advantages:
- More power for Windows on multi-core CPUs (e.g. for image processing systems)
- Provide scalable systems where depending on the RTOS performance Windows may or may not run the the same CPU core.
Another point is that on CPUs that support Hyperthreading (e.g. Intel Atom N270) it is not reasonable to run the RTOS on a separate core.
As there is no real separate core the usage of HT usually leads to unacceptable latencies and extreme jitter values on the RTOS.
The better solution here is to turn hyperthreading off to get better latencies and lower jitter values.
C: When Windows is running there are no restrictions using the KUKA real-time technology.
Many virtualization solutions run Windows under a restricted environment.
This may lead to several restrictions like:
- Under Windows there's no ACPI functionality available
- Windows cannot run on more than one CPU core
- Windows will run with reduced performance
- The Windows processor microcode update driver cannot be loaded, important processor microcode update may not have be installed then
D: High quality: the technology is long-term proven, a very big effort is made for quality assurance.
Since more than 10 years KUKA is using this technology in their own robot control systems.
Today almost 100.000 systems are running world-wide, the best prove for safeness and robustness of the technology!
Highly automated test scenarios on more than 40 different PC test systems are made - this type of quality assurance guarantees a high quality product.
