PowerFax M-E1 30-Port Digital Fax Board

Specifications

The Commetrex PowerFax M-E1, a 30-line fax board with an integrated E1 digital trunk interface with PTT approvals in over 37 countries, employs the latest in DSP technology to halve the cost of a high-density PC-based fax board. The M-E1, and its sister products, the M-4, M-8 and the M-T1, redefine the economics of fax servers of all types. 

Although it is priced at approximately fifty percent less than competitive products it offers world-class, market-proven performance, and, unmatched system density. The M-E1 software is available for the Windows NT operating system.

The M-Series offers the only fully automated GUI-based installation and configuration process for an intelligent fax board. The install procedure offers all of the choices the fax expert needs in an easy-to-use process designed for the non-technical user. 

For those wishing to use the M-E1 with a commercially available fax system, it is supported by a growing number of M-Series-Compatible Fax Software Systems. 

The PowerFax M-E1 is designed to simplify application development and ease end-user installation. It includes, in addition to fax send and receive, file-format conversion, document-queue management, and fax-status functions. And the M-Series Fax Description Language (M-Series FDL) supports the dynamic assembly of a fax from multiple elements, such as graphics and text.

Features

• High density -- 30 fax lines per board
• Integrated digital E1 trunk interface
• Automated software install/deinstall
• 14.4 Kbps send/receive
• Turnaround polling
• Dynamic document re-sizing and re-encoding
• DSP-based fax software
• No-charge software upgrades
• M-Series Fax Description Language 
• Comprehensive API and developer's kit
• C-language demo programs
• Highest-productivity development environment
• Unlimited technical support
• Support for EuroISDN
• Approvals in 37 countries

Benefits

• Economical, high-density systems
• Uses one slot - reduced system size and cost
• Simplifies installation - reduces opportunity for errors
• Software-defined functionality offers the ultimate in system configurability.
• Updated fax-resource software at no additional cost
• On-the-fly creation of fax text and documents
• Turnaround polling with document ID simplifies fax-on-demand systems
• Comprehensive technical support and demo programs speed system development
• Broad market coverage

Overview
The PowerFax M-E1 multiline fax system combines Windows NT APIs, the M-Series modems, 30 ports of fax and an E1 integrated digital trunk interface on a single, long ISA slot PC add-in board. The M-E1 includes an "enhanced-compliant" MVIP switch to support advanced applications that require inter-board connection and switching. The M-E1 also includes a powerful, '386-class control processor and a large DRAM to dramatically reduce host-PC overhead. The fax modems are implemented on open-architecture Texas Instruments DSPs, allowing easy software upgrades to take advantage of the latest software releases.

Commetrex' MultiFax, the M-E1's technology foundation and field proven since mid-1993 as an OEM software product, is being used by over 100 fax-system developers in Asia, North America, and Europe. It is being used in the most demanding applications to send and receive hundreds of thousands of faxes a day. But the M-E1 is not just a proven multiline fax board. It's a comprehensive developer's system that supports the rapid development of high-function fax systems of all types. With its exclusive Fax Description Language (FDL), the M-Series developer can easily implement information-service platforms which create ad hoc fax images from disparate elements such as text and graphical objects.

The M-Series boards have the highest fax-machine connection rate in the industry. Not only has the M-Series T.30 protocol software been refined in over four years of market use, the M-Series can also dynamically re-size and re-encode fax images to suit the capabilities of the receiving terminal. This means a B4 M-Series image can be dynamically converted to A4 size should the receiving terminal not support B4. Similarly, MR-encoded images will be dynamically converted to MH should the receiving terminal not support MR.

Installation and Configuration Package
The M-Series's easy-to-use graphical installation and configuration process finds and verifies the M-Series boards installed in the system and guides the user through the set-up process. This automated installation procedure makes the M-Series ideal for applications, such as fax servers, where the installer is often an untrained reseller or end user. The installation package is designed to dramatically reduce the support costs associated with broad market distribution.

Applications
The M-E1 offers the fax-system end-user or developer, the lowest-cost, highest-density, PC-based multiline fax platform available. It is suitable for any multiline fax application, and is used most frequently in high-volume, fax-server, fax-mail and fax store-and-forward applications. 

System Environment
The M-E1 provides you with the most productive development environment available for fax applications. There are three main data structures in the M-Series: M-Series Document Queues (MDQs), Fax Status structures, and M-Series System Parameters. MDQs, which are managed with 7 M-Series functions, contain documents to be sent and received. This permits documents to be easily assembled independently of the fax application, strongly supporting broadcast applications and client/server architectures. The Fax Status structures reflect the status of the current fax operation, including such indications as current page, current document, fax negotiation results, transfer rate, resolution, encoding, and error codes. System parameters hold information such as the default values for subscriber ID, country code, and manufacturer ID.

The M-E1's API is identical to that of all other members of the PowerFax M-Series. This means the application, including all call-control functions, is developed without regard to the board being used, significantly lowering the development-resource commitment of supporting a broad range of system sizes and international markets.

M-Series FDL
M-Series Fax Description Language (FDL) macros support the creation of faxes from dynamically assembled elements. For example, a personalized fax letter including information obtained from a centralized database, a pre-scanned signature, the date, time, and even a per-call personalized paragraph, can be created and transmitted in seconds. 

Examples of FDL macros are:

• @CONVERT:END
• @CONVERT:PADTOEND
• @CONVERT:FILE
• @CONVERT:PAGEBREAK
• @CONVERT:FONT
• @CONVERT:PAGESIZE
• @CONVERT:MARGIN
• @CONVERT:TEXT

Additional Specifications

• HOST REQUIREMENTS: Pentium PC with Windows NT
  
  
• BOARD WARRANTY: 7-year hardware warranty
  
  
• CEPT E1 G.703 TELEPHONY INTERFACE
• Interface: Full featured G.703 2048 Kbps trunk interface. Complete interface to one E1 trunk
  
• Framing: CEPT G.703 Channel Associated Signaling
• Insertion and Detection: ABCD bits for Channel Associated Signaling and HDLC/LAPD for generating/Terminating a data link.
• Line Code: HDB3 or AMI (no zero-code suppression)>
• Alarm Signal Capabilities: Loss of Frame Alignment (OOF), Loss of Signaling Multiframe Alignment, Loss of CRC Multiframe Alignment (red), Remote Alarm and Remote Multiframe Alarm (yellow), Alarm Indication Signal (AIS) (blue)
• Counts: Bit error rate and CRC error
• Loopback: Per channel and across channels under software control
• Connector: 75 ohm BNC coax or 120 ohm RJ-48C
  
  
• TONE DIALING
  
  • DTMF Digits: 0-9, *, # and ABCD per ITU-T Q.23 and Q.24
  • Rate: Programmable (10 digits/sec nominal)
  • Dialing Parameters: Software controllable
  • Dialing Amplitude: Network compatible (configurable by country) programmable range -33 dBm to 1 dBm
    
    
• DTMF TONE DETECTION
  • DTMF Digits: 0-9, *, #, ABCD
  • Dynamic Range: -40 dBm to 0 dBm per tone, (configurable)
  • Tone Duration: 40 ms (minimum)
  • Acceptable Twist: 10 dB
    
    
• ENVIRONMENT
  
  • Operating Temperature: 0 degrees C to 50 degrees C
  • Storage Temperature: -20 degrees to 70 degrees C
  • Humidity: 5 to 80%, non-condensing
    
    
• ON-BOARD PROCESSORS AND MEMORY
  
  • DSPs: 6 Texas Instruments TMS320C51 DSPs at 50 MIPS each
  • Microprocessor: 25 MHz 80386SX
  • Memory: 2 MB of dedicated DRAM for the on-board microprocessor and 256 KB of fast static RAM for the on-board microprocessor (128 KB shared with the host and 128 KB shared with the DSPs)
    
    
• MVIP DIGITAL SWITCHING
  • Enhanced-compliant MVIP interface provides total flexibility in connecting E1 channels to DSP resources, to other E1 channels, or to MVIP bus timeslots. Note that connections between E1 channels, or between E1 channels and other on-board resources, do not tie up MVIP bus timeslots. MVIP timeslots are only consumed when needed for inter-board connections.
    
    
• STANDARDS COMPLIANCE
  
  • G.703: Physical/electrical characteristics of hierarchical digital network
  • G.704: Synchronous frame structures used at primary and secondary hierarchical levels
  • G.706: Frame alignment and cyclic redundancy check procedures
  • G.732: Characteristics of primary PCM multiplex equipment
  • G.823: Control of jitter and wander within digital networks based on 2048 Kpbs hierarchy
  • ANSI T1E1/88-00: IRI carrier to customer installation DS1 metallic interface
  • EN55022, EN50082-1: European EMI/EMC Standards
    
    
• ORDERING INFORMATION
  • PN 10016-1: M-E1, 75 ohm BNC coax
  • PN 10016-2: M-E1, 120 ohm RJ-48C
  • PN 30016-1: M-E1, 75 ohm BNC coax Starter Kit (includes M-Series Developer's Kit)
  • PN 30016-2: M-E1, 120 ohm RJ-48C Starter Kit (includes M-Series Developer's Kit)