IEEE 1355
Heterogeneous Interconnect (HIC)
Low-cost, Low-Latency Scalable Serial Interconnect for Parallel System Construction

HIC Bus Description

This page describes the basic electrical requirements for IEEE 1355.
However it does not appear that the standard was ever updated after its original 1995 release date.
So caution should be used when designing to IEEE 1355, as it may no longer be supported, or up to date.

The HIC {Heterogeneous InterConnect} bus provides a bidirectional serial interconnect which builds a scalable parallel system using a pair(s) of unidirectional lines.
IEEE-1355 defines the physical and Logic Link layers between Chip-to-Chip, Board-to-Board, or Chassis-to-Chassis [via cabling].
The Electrical and timing interfaces are defined, as well as the cabling, connectors and pin-out [for both electrical and fiber interfaces].
Board traces are defined to be 'Transmission Lines' with an impedance of either 50 or 100 ohms.
The electrical interface is specified as standard TTL interfaces [switching level], using either 3.3v or 5 volt supplies. Two links are defined; Data and Strobe.
The Strobe line changes state only when the data line carries the same level on the next bit time, so the 'clock' is derived from both the Strobe and Data lines.
Data is sent as 8 bit long characters [LSB first] preceded by a Start bit [0], and a parity bit [Odd]. An inversion bit and Stop bit [0] are sent after the data word.
A number of Control characters are defined. The HIC bus uses 8B/12B encoding (each 8 bit byte is translated into a 12 bit character in order to equalize the numbers of 1's and 0's sent).
Which is 1 Start bit, 1 Parity bit, 8 Data bit, 1 Inversion bit, 1 Stop bit; 12 bits which represent one 8 bit word.
The FIber-Optic version uses the data encoded into Symbols

HIC Bit Transitions

Four types of interconnect media are provided [Connectors per IEC 1076-4-107]:
Copper wire [4] wires [1 Meters cable distance at 38MBps]
Differential [4] twisted pairs [1 to 10 Meters cable distance at 38MBps]
Fiber-optic cable [100 to 3000 Meters cable distance at 169MBps, distance depends on fiber type]
Single-Ended [Coaxial cable] [8 Meters maximum cable distance at 169MBps]

Runs between 10 Mbps and 200Mbps and 1Gbps at standard TTL transition levels allowing either 3.3 volt or 5 volt levels.

HIC Bus Standards

ANSI/VITA13: VMEbus Pin Assignment for ISO/IEC 14575, IEEE 1355-1995 (H.I.C.)
VITA 13 re-maps IEEE Std 1355 onto the VMEbus, although VITA-13 does not appear to be a valid document standard any longer.
So any VMEbus system using a 3-row P2 connector might be mapping the user defined pins as a HIC interface.
Than again the 160 pin connectors were introduced in 1997, rendering the 96 pin connectors out-dated.
Also the VPX series of VME boards were introduced in 2007, rendering the 160 pin connectors out-dated.
In other words the HIC interface may reside on a legacy VMEbus, but would not be found on a newer system.

IEEE 1355-1995: IEEE Standard for Heterogeneous Interconnect (HIC) (Low-cost, Low-Latency Scalable Serial Interconnect for Parallel System Construction)

ISO/IEC 14575 DIS:

IEEE 1355.2: SpaceWire,
SpaceWire Serial Point-to-Point Links ECSS-E-50-12; Draft Issue C

IEEE; Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers, Inc. [www.ieee.org]
esa; European Space Agency [www.esa.int]

VMEbus HIC Mapping

This table represents the signal assignments for a HIC interface on the VMEbus.
As found on a 3-row 96 pin VME DIN connector, using the user defined pins on rows A and C.
Row B is pre-defined in the VME specification and remains unchanged.
Note that this pre-dates the 5-row connectors that were introduced a few years later.

HIC Bus Interface IC Manufacturers

The HIC bus uses standard TTL Switching levels [5V] or 3.3V Low Voltage [LV] TTL, LV Switching levels for the electrical interface.
The following page lists TTL IC Manufacturers. All other Integrated Circuit types IC Manufacturers.

Note when used on the VMEbus has VITA-13 these are just signals running on a backplane between cards.
The signals defined in IEEE-1355 are mapped onto the VME connectors, there are no copper or fiber cables.

The standard engineering warning found on a number of these electrical interface pages; don't design in out-dated standards.
Or, don't design to out-dated standards unless the requirements dictate it, as in communication with an out-dated legacy card is required.

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Modified 6/13/15
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