IGT wins big with QNX

IGT (International Game Technology) of Reno, Nevada, manufactures and operates computerized casino gaming equipment. With annual revenues of more than $1B US and sales of 100,000 machines a year, IGT is the largest gaming manufacturer in the world.

As part of its business, IGT develops electronically linked, inter-casino systems that connect statewide gaming machines with a central computer. The jackpot builds with every wager, until some lucky player hits the right combination, potentially winning millions of dollars.

IGT’s latest generation of inter-casino gaming machines are part 3-D video game, part security box, and part multiconnected network device— highly sophisticated equipment with enormous computing demands: The machines produce fully animated video at 85 frames per second; they’re protected by a sophisticated online security system; they track user loyalty and payouts; they handle money; and they employ a variety of standard and proprietary network protocols, each running simultaneously and each with strict timing requirements.

Quick Facts

• IGT (International Game Technology) develops electronically linked, inter-casino systems that connect statewide gaming machines
• These machines, which can pay out multi-million-dollar winnings, must perform a host of complex functions with zero tolerance for error
• To run these machines, IGT adopted the QNX Neutrino RTOS for its modular microkernel based architecture
• This architecture allows IGT to segregate processes and achieve the extreme reliability and system integrity that the company requires

Zero tolerance for system failure
“These machines have to run reliably 24 hours a day, seven days a week,” says Steven LeMay, director, Advanced Video Platform (AVP) with IGT. “If a touch screen interface fails, we don’t want that malfunction to create some stray pattern that erroneously produces the biggest win possible. We can’t tolerate failure.” 

With stakes that high, IGT needed an operating system that would reliably manage the machines’ many complicated real-time functions. The company considered many operating systems, including Linux and Microsoft solutions, but only QNX met their stringent requirements.“Other systems couldn’t handle our real-time operating system needs,” says Mr. LeMay. “In our business,‘really fast’ just doesn’t cut it.”

QNX selected for microkernel architecture
IGT selected the QNX Neutrino 6.1 real-time operating system (RTOS) because its modular microkernel architecture offered the necessary reliability. IGT was able to segregate and protect logic processes so that the failure of one would not affect another. Despite this segregation, processes communicate with one another highly efficiently—another credit to QNX.

“By taking advantage of the QNX microkernel architecture and its inherent modular design, we’re able to make sure that every part runs reliably,” says Mr. LeMay.

IGT wrote virtually all of its code with C++ and used CodeWarrior for QNX RTOS 2.1 from Metrowerks for creating, compiling, linking, and debugging.

Modular architecture permits efficient development
“The project has gone very, very well,” says Mr. LeMay. “The QNX OS allowed us to achieve our desired reliability levels, and it enabled our developers to work on different tasks without affecting one another. As a result, we conducted our development process very efficiently. We were also able to test everything individually, which gives us a higher potential for reliability when all the pieces come together.”

Mr. LeMay says that QNX is the right choice for real-time operating system applications. “QNX gives you the flexibility to create solutions completely on your own, and the standard APIs allow you to adapt open-source solutions as well,” he says. “On top of that, QNX Software Systems stands behind its product and supports you. That’s an attractive combination.”