HARDWARE / PRODUCTAdded 11 Jul 2026

ABACUS On-Board Computer

GAUSS Srl
ABACUS On-Board Computer

General-purpose dual-core (MCU + FPGA) on-board computer for satellite and CubeSat missions with flight-proven heritage.

Typed specifications16 values

Discloses 6 of 13 fields engineers filter by in this category (category median 5).

Processor
Two cores (MCU MSP430 and FPGA Spartan-3E)
datasheet p.1
Mass
59 g
about · datasheet p.2
CPU clock
25 MHz
FPGA running at · datasheet p.1 25 MHz running up to
RAM
16 MB
datasheet p.1
Mass storage
2 GB
datasheet p.1 0.016 GB
Supply voltage
5 V
powered from · datasheet p.2
Power consumption
0.05 W
for low power consumption · datasheet p.2
Data interface
RS-422
datasheet p.1 I2C  |  SPI  |  LVDS
Operating temperature
-40 °C
operating temperature range · datasheet p.2 85 °C operating temperature range
Flight heritage
UniCubeSat-GG (2012 , CubeSat 1U); UniSat-5 (2013, microsatellite of 32kg); UniSat-6 (2014, microsatellite of 26kg); TigriSat (2014, CubeSat 3U); Serpens (2015, CubeSat 3U).
datasheet p.2

Each value is typed with its unit and measurement condition and cites the datasheet page it was taken from. Nothing is guessed: a field that is absent here has not been published by the manufacturer. machine-extracted ✓ checked by NewSpace Market ✓ manufacturer confirmed by the manufacturer.

As published by the supplier22 lines, in the manufacturer's own wording
Cores
Two cores (MCU MSP430 and FPGA Spartan-3E) directly interconnected with a 24-line bus
Mcu
MSP430 EP series, 16-bit RISC MCU, up to 25 MHz, HiRel Enhanced Product (Texas Instruments)
Analog i/o
10x 3.3 V analog input; up to 45x digital GPIO channels
Gpio
16x voltage-level-shiftable GPIOs with interrupt features
Com ports
4x COM ports (one also RS422/485, Full or Half Duplex)
Bus interfaces
2x I2C and 1x SPI bus
FPGA
Xilinx Spartan-3E FPGA, RAM based core, 500K gates
FPGA gpio
34x GPIO (usable as LVDS) and 8x GPI channels
FPGA clock
25 MHz or 100 MHz (default)
Memory
Embedded 16Mb (2 MB) SRAM for FPGA; 2x 16 MB flash NOR memories
Reprogrammability
FPGA and MCU reprogrammable from ground
IMU
Embedded 3-axis magnetometer, accelerometer and gyroscope
Sensors
3x temperature sensors, 1x drawn current monitor
Rtc
Embedded RTC
Mass
59 g
Form factor
PC/104 CubeSat form factor compatible
Power consumption
50 mW (FPGA OFF, MCU ON, recording sensor data)
Power input
5 V satellite bus
Components grade
Off the shelf industrial / automotive
Operating temperature
-40C to +85C
Flight heritage
UniCubeSat-GG (2012), UniSat-5 (2013), UniSat-6 (2014), TigriSat (2014), Serpens (2015), UniSat-7 - 6+ years continuous flight heritage
TRL
9 (flight-proven)

About

ABACUS is an OBC (On-Board Computer) subsystem with a general-purpose hardware platform, suited for a wide range of satellite and CubeSat missions. It is designed to be flexible and scalable in terms of processing power, with the goal of maintaining very low power consumption. The two cores (MCU MSP430 and FPGA Spartan-3E, interconnected via a 24-line bus) offer many operating modalities (e.g. Master/Slave or multi-Master), and the FPGA offers all the advantages of RTL coding for implementing specific tasks (e.g. attitude control) or generic systems, including third-party IP cores. With the FPGA, high reliability may be achieved using triple modular redundancy (TMR) configuration codes. Several embedded sensors provide health monitoring and attitude control data (3-axis magnetometer, accelerometer, gyroscope). The system design offers the possibility to reconfigure the FPGA code and MCU firmware in flight. ABACUS has reached more than six years of continuous flight heritage on UniSat-6, TigriSat and UniSat-7.

Documentation

Need the full ICD, test reports or a specific revision? Ask the supplier directly.

Source: www.gauss.space ↗

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