Page 1 PC Engines ALIX.2 / ALIX.3 / ALIX.6 series system boards...
Page 2 ©2007-2009 PC Engines GmbH. All rights reserved. PC Engines GmbH www.pcengines.ch tinyBIOS and PC Engines are trademarks of PC Engines GmbH. All other marks and brands are property of their respective owners. ALIX system board 5/5/2010...
Page 3: Table Of Contents
Table of contents Federal Communications Commission Statement CE Declaration of Conformity Compliance information Recycling / disposal Introduction / features OEM options ALIX.2 series ALIX.3 series ALIX.6 series Setup options BIOS upgrade PXE boot Power over Ethernet Hardware compatibility High power radio cards...
Page 4: Federal Communications Commission Statement
A copy of the test report will be provided on request. CE Declaration of Conformity We, PC Engines GmbH, declare that ALIX.2, ALIX.3 and ALIX.6 series boards, when installed in PC Engines metal enclosures. (case1c1 / case1c2 / box2c), are in conformance with:...
Page 5: Compliance Information
Testing for CE mark must be done at the level of the complete product, possibly including the wireless cards. Please contact PC Engines for assistance and documentation. For satisfactory resistance to electrostatic discharge events (ESD), the ALIX board should be grounded (e.g.
Page 6: Introduction / Features
Introduction / features PC Engines ALIX boards are small form factor system boards optimized for wireless routing and network security applications. • AMD Geode LX CPU, 433 Mhz (LX700) or 500 MHz (LX800) 5x86 CPU, • 256 KB cache (64K data + 64K instruction + 128K L2) •...
Page 7: Alix.2 Series
ALIX.2 series Configuration 2 LAN / 2 miniPCI, or 3 LAN / 1 miniPCI Power supply 7 to 20V DC, about 3 to 4W at Linux idle, peak about 6W without miniPCI cards and USB devices. Suggest a 18V / 15W supply. Center pin = positive, sleeve = ground, 2.1 mm diameter.
Page 8: Alix.3 Series
ALIX.3 series Configuration 1 LAN / 2 miniPCI Power supply 7 to 20V DC, about 2.5 to 3.5W at Linux idle, peak about 5W without miniPCI cards and USB devices. Suggest a 18V / 15W supply. Center pin = positive, sleeve = ground, 2.1 mm diameter. Temperature range 0 to 50°C.
Page 9: Alix.6 Series
ALIX.6 series Configuration 2 LAN / 1 miniPCI / 1 miniPCI express (USB only, no PCI Express support) Power supply 7 to 20V DC, about 3 to 4W at Linux idle, peak about 6W without miniPCI cards and USB devices. Suggest a 18V / 15W supply. Center pin = positive, sleeve = ground, 2.1 mm diameter.
Page 10: Setup Options
ALIX.3*3 is different, uses Award BIOS. Press Delete to enter setup, Escape to get the boot menu. Setup options To enter setup, type S during the memory test. You should see something like the following: PC Engines ALIX.2 v0.98j 640 KB Base Memory 261120 KB Extended Memory...
Page 11: Bios Upgrade
ALIX implements a passive power over Ethernet scheme, using the unused pairs of LAN1 for power. Power can be injected using a passive POE splitter such as PC Engines POE.1A. . ALIX is NOT compatible with 48V / IEEE 802.3af POE. Please use an external splitter if required.
Page 12: High Power Radio Cards
High power radio cards Earlier production boards don’t react kindly to the abuse dished out by high power radio cards. Change the following component values: ALIX.2C R83 = 2.2K ohm (was 1.0K / marking 01B) C98 = 4.7 nF (was no stuff) ALIX.3C R73 = 2.2K ohm (was 1.0K / marking 01B) C93 = 4.7 nF (was no stuff)
Page 13: Alix Block Diagram
ALIX block diagram Schematics are available online ! ALIX connector pinouts References refer to ALIX.2 / ALIX.3 / ALIX.6. J5/J3/ J5 COM1 serial port The standard PC pinout is used. To connect to a PC, use a null modem or “Laplink” cable. Due to limitations of the AMD CS5536 companion chip, only RXD / TXD are available for your software;...
Page 14 3.3V supply transmit data (output) receive data (input) ground J12 / J4 / J12 COM2 serial port (build option) As an option, the board can be configured with a 4 or 5 pin header with 3.3V CMOS signal levels instead of the normal RS-232 serial port. On alix.2c / alix.3c boards, this port is connected in parallel to COM1, need to remove MAX3243 serial driver to use.
Page 15 J19 / - / - USB header (build option) Install to get access to additional USB ports inside the enclosure. +5V supply (not switched / fused) DATA4- negative data DATA3- negative data DATA4+ positive data DATA3+ positive data ground key pin ground J4/J2 / J2 DC power jack...
Page 16 ground HDIORDY IDE I/O ready CSEL cable select (pull down) HDACK# IDE DMA acknowledge ground HDIRQ IDE interrupt no connect HDA1 IDE address 1 HDPDIA# IDE diagnostic, 80 pin cable ID HDA0 IDE address 0 HDA2 IDE address 2 HDCS0# IDE chip select 0 HDCS1# IDE chip select 1...
Page 17 The LPC port is used in the factory to connect an alternate flash BIOS to start the board when the on-board flash is corrupted or blank. Use PC Engines adapter LPC.1A for this purpose if needed. The LCP port can also be used to connect a super I/O device. Unlike SC1100 based WRAP boards, this port cannot be reprogrammed as GPIO pins.
Page 18 +3.3V supply SERIRQ serial interrupt LDRQ# LPC DMA request J13 / J8 I2C bus (build option) This optional header can be used to connect user specific hardware, e.g. a front panel microcontroller, or for a licensing dongle. See AMD CS5536 data sheet for programming details. +3.3V power supply SMB_SCL...
Page 19 Specification: CR2032, horizontal mount, 20.4 mm lead spacing, for example Renata CR2032FH1 or Panasonic BR2032-1HE. BU1 / BU1 / - Buzzer (build option) Optional audio transducer. The footprint fits a Hycom HY-05 or equivalent. On alix.2c / alix.3d, the driver circuit is not populated, please see page 7 of the schematics for details if you want to add this function.
Page 20: Status Leds
Status LEDs Status LEDs are all turned on by the BIOS on power up. The BIOS will turn off LEDs 2 and 3 before booting the operating system. Location GPIO read port write port LED1 (left) port 06100h bit 6 port 06100h bit 6 / 22 LED2 (middle) port 06180h bit 9...
Page 21: Bios Post Codes
BIOS POST codes tinyBIOS writes POST / diagnostic codes to port 80h. To make these codes visible, use a miniPCI POST card such as PC Engines POST.5A. POST codes are: reset entry chipset initialization detect base memory size initialize shadow RAM...

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Alix.3 series Alix.6 series