A high speed data acquisition and processing system for real time data analysis and control

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A high speed data acquisition system which is closely coupled with a high speed digital processor is described. Data acquisition at a rate of 40 million 14 bit data values per second is possible simultaneously with data processing at a rate of 80 million floating point operations per second. This is achieved by coupling a commercially available VME format single board computer based on the Intel i860 microprocessor with a custom designed first-in, first-out memory circuit that transfers data at high speed to the processor board memory. Parallel processing to achieve increased computation speed is easily implemented because the data can be transferred simultaneously to multiple processor boards. Possible applications include high speed process control and real time data reduction. A specific example is described in which this hardware is used to implement a feedback control system for 18 parameters which uses 100 input signals and achieves a 100 μs cycle time.