Fault Tolerant Computing Testbed : A tool for the Analysis of Hardware and Software Fault Handling Techniques

Operating computers in space requires the use of very expensive radiation hardened microelectronics devices. Unfortunately, the United States radiation hardened market is rapidly shrinking and makes up a very small percentage of the commercial market. For these reasons, and the fact that commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) devices are cheaper, more capable, readily available, and software availability is much greater, the use of COTS devices in future space systems is fast becoming a reality. A significant disadvantage of COTS devices is their susceptibility to radiation induced single event upsets (SEUs), among other radiation effects which are detrimental to electronic systems. This thesis focuses on the board level design of a tool which enables the analysis of fault tolerant computing techniques in a laboratory environment in the presence of radiation induced SEUs. When implemented, this tool will be beneficial to the study of using COTS devices in space. The tool will provide the capability to analyze the performance of hardware redundancy techniques and software algorithms intended to improve the performance of COTS microprocessors in this environment prior to their use in designs intended for actual space applications. Cadence Concept(TM) design schematics, associated Verilog(registered) code and simulation results are presented to develop this concept.Naval Postgraduate School Monterey CA is the author of 'Fault Tolerant Computing Testbed : A tool for the Analysis of Hardware and Software Fault Handling Techniques', published 1998 under ISBN 9781423554882 and ISBN 1423554884.