search

opencomputeproject / Time-Appliance-Project

Develop an end-to-end hypothetical reference model, network architectures, precision time tools, performance objectives and the methods to distribute, operate, monitor time synchronization within data center and much more...
MIT License
1.33k stars 101 forks source link

External atomic clock for laptops & such #57

Closed greereer closed 2 years ago

greereer commented 2 years ago

How feasible do you think the following is:

An external solution that enables my computer's (a Dell XPS for example) outgoing packets to be timestamped with a very accurate clock however as you know my stock NIC does not support hardware timestamping nor do I have a PCIe slot.

My proposal:

A NIC with hardware time stamping and built in rubidium oscillator connected to my laptop via USB

The outgoing packets are sent to the NIC to be accurately timestamped before being transmitted

More power could be supplied to the external setup by an additional 5v usb connection

Ideally the only thing the computer would need is downloadable drivers to alter the ptp handling of the computer.

It will require a method of detecting and compensating for changes in latency between the NIC and computer caused by for instance using a different length USB cables/setups.

I would really like to further this idea, if you could let me know what you think I would be very grateful.

ahmadexp commented 2 years ago

The closes to your idea can be found on the following link which was done for the raspberry pi. https://www.cnx-software.com/2021/08/17/raspberry-pi-4-ieee1588-precision-time-protocol-ptp-with-real-time-hat/#:~:text=InnoRoute%20Real%2DTime%20HAT%20adds,enable%20measurement%20and%20control%20systems. Couple that with a time card and you are good to go. I will be more than happy to learn more about your application.

greereer commented 2 years ago

Hi, thanks for the info, will follow up now