Neousys PCIe-AE304bp 4-Port 100/1000BASE-T1 Automotive Ethernet PCIe Card with H-MTD Connectors and PTP

LiDARs, radars and many newer vehicle sensors talk over Automotive Ethernet, a single twisted pair that a standard network card cannot connect to without a media converter for each port. The Neousys PCIe-AE304bp removes the converters: it is a half-length PCIe card with four native 100/1000BASE-T1 ports, for ADAS test benches, autonomous driving validation rigs and in-vehicle edge computers.

The four ports follow IEEE 802.3bw (100BASE-T1) and IEEE 802.3bp (1000BASE-T1) on Marvell 88Q2221M transceivers, and each one can be set as master or slave and switched between 100 and 1000 Mbps in software. Cable runs reach up to 15 m of unshielded twisted pair. The connectors are Z-coded H-MTD automotive types that lock in place, which avoids the intermittent connections an RJ45 plug can suffer under vibration.

Hardware timestamping for IEEE 1588 PTP v1 and v2 and IEEE 802.1AS keeps the PCIe-AE304bp synchronised with connected sensors to sub-microsecond accuracy, so LiDAR points, radar returns and camera frames can be lined up in time. The card needs a PCIe Gen2 x4 link in a standard x4 slot, and Neousys verifies it on Ubuntu 22.04 and 24.04 with its driver. Because the card buffers very little to keep latency low, Neousys recommends using one of its verified host configurations.

The PCIe-AE304bp runs fanless from -25 °C to 70 °C, with Neousys recommending airflow for parts of that range, and meets CE and FCC Class A to EN 55032 and EN 55035. For PoE+ camera ports in the same kind of host, see the PCIe-PoE-at series, and for 10GbE vision cameras, see the PCIe-550X series.