HP 9000/T600, T520, T500 & 890
| Quick Facts | |
|---|---|
| CPU | 1-4 PA-7000 1-12 PA-7100 1-14 PA-7150 1-12 PA-8000 60-180 MHz |
| Caches | 2-4 MB L1 (8 MB L2) |
| RAM | 2-3.75 GB |
| Drives | external |
| Expansion | VSC HP-PB HSC |
| Bandwidth | CPU 240 MB/s per CPU 890 sys: 240 MB/s T5x0 sys: 480 MB/s T600: 960 MB/s I/O: ≤240 MB/s |
| I/O | SCSI Console |
Overview
The T-Class servers are large 32-bit PA-RISC mainframes from the mid-1990s, built with modular system cards that contain processors, memory or I/O devices. The main system backplane features sixteen (16) slots, of which eight can be used for memory or processor boards, and the other eight for I/O boards and converters. These boards plug into the main system VSC bus at 60 MHz.
The HP 9000/890 was an early iteration of the architecture, with the later T500/T600 being updated sucessors. After the 64-bit T600 the basic system design of the T-Class was discontinued in favor of the more flexible SuperDome systems.
Model numbers and introductions dates:
| System | Model number | Introduced | Price |
|---|---|---|---|
| 890 | HP 9000/890 | ||
| T500 | HP 9000/891 | 1993/1994 | $165,000 uni $660,000 12-way |
| T520 | HP 9000/892 | 1995 | $145,000 uni $520,000 14-way |
| T600 | HP 9000/893 | 1997 |
Internals
CPU
- 890: 1-4 PA-70001 60 MHz with 2 MB/2 MB I/D off-chip L1 cache
- T500: 1-12 PA-7100 90 MHz with 1 MB/1 MB I/D off-chip L1 cache
- T520: 1-14 PA-7150 120 MHz with 1 MB/1 MB I/D off-chip L1 cache
- T600: 1-12 PA-8000 180 MHz with 1 MB/1 MB I/D off-chip L1 cache and 4 MB/4 MB I/D off-chip L2 cache3
- Not quite sure if this is really a PA-7000, the documenation is not explicit about it
- The off-chip caches of all CPUs are quite large — especially on the 890 server
- The T600 was apparently the only system with a PA-8000 processor with L2 cache (an L2 cache possibility was not even mentioned on the PA-8000 documentation)
Processor cards
The processor cards attach the processors and support chips to the main system bus via slots for processors, memory and I/O cards.
The 890 and the T-Class have slighly different architectures:
9000/890
- Processor cards contain eight (8) VLSI CMOS chips:
- Up to four processor cards per system
The chip configuration looks like a PCX processor (the CMUX and FP chips), the other parameters contradict this however (main memory, clock speed, bus interfaces).
T500, T520 and T600
- Processor cards contain each up to two processor modules with the actual CPUs
- Up to six (T500/T600) or seven (T520) processor cards per system
- Processor card chips:
- Two Viper system bus (VSC) interface (408-pin version)
- Bus support chips
- T600: 4 MB L2 I cache and 4 MB L2 D cache (each two modules)
- Processor module chips:
Chipset
The chipsets depend on the plug-in I/O cards.
- Viper processor to system bus interface (integrated on processor cards)
- HP-PB to VSC bus converter, integrated on the HP-PB interface cards
- Common HP-PB plug-in cards:
- Fast/Wide SCSI
- MUX
- LAN/console
- HP-FL fiber link interface
- T600: HP-HSC I/O Bus Converter
- Service processor, controls all hardware and power of the system, integrated into a single-board located in the main cardcage
Buses
- PBus processor/memory bus, 60 MHz, 32-bit data path between single CPUs and their Viper main bus interfaces (ie, one PBus per processor card on 890 servers, two PBuses per card on all others), 240 MB/s each
- VSC central system bus, 60 MHz clock
- 890: 32-bit wide with 240 MB/s data rate
- T500/T520: 64-bit wide with 480 MB/s data rate
- T600: 128-bit wide with 960 MB/s data rate
- PBus and VSC are configured for PBus Variant 2
Scalable MP
multiprocessing attachment - Probably on T600: Runway CPU/memory bus (although not mentioned in documentation)
- T600: GSC+ expansion bus (in HSC variant)
- HP-PB bus for general I/O (one bus per HP-PB system card — one shared HP-PB bus per each 14-slot card module), 8 MHz
- SCSI depends on installed I/O cards
Memory
- Memory cards, in sizes of 64-768 MB (not all systems support all cards)
- Up to eight cards in P MB card slots 1-14
- Memory attaches to shared VSC system bus, 64-bit data path, and 128-bit data path on T600
- Cards operate at VSC bus frequency and have on-card interfaces to VSC bus
- 890: max 2 GB main memory
- T500/T520/T600: max 3.75 GB main memory
Expansion
- T600: 24 HSC (GSC+) slots (depends on HP-PB slot usage)
- 14 HP-PB slots (single-height — 7 double-height)
- Up to 98 additional HP-PB slots can be added through
expanion cabinets
that connect an additional HP-PB bus to one of the system card slots (T600 can apparently add up to 154 additional HP-PB slots)
Drives
- Drives located in external drive bays or racks
External connectors
- 50-pin HD SCSI-2 single-ended
- TP/RJ45 10BaseT 10 Mbit Ethernet
- Two DB9 male RS232C serial, one for console, one for USV
- DB25 female parallel
- Two PS/2 connectors for keyboard und mouse
References
Manuals
- CE Handbook HP 3000 99x Family, HP T-Class Family Hewlett-Packard Company (October 1998, edition E1098, part number A1809-96061)
- Installation Guide T-Class HP 3000 99x Family, HP 9000 Systems (.pdf) Hewlett-Packard Company (July 1998, edition 8/E0798, part number A1809-90001)
Articles
- Corporate Business Servers: An Alternative to Mainframes for Business Computing (.pdf) Thomas B. Alexander et al (June 1994: Hewlett-Packard Journal)
Operating systems
The 890 servers support only HP-UX:
- Last supported version 10.20 for 800s servers.
The T-Class also only support HP-UX:
- 10.20 for 800s servers
- 11.00 and 11i v1
- T600: additionally 11.00 64-bit and 11i 64-bit v1
Benchmarks
| Model | SPEC92, int | SPEC92, fp | SPEC95, int | SPEC95, fp | SPEC95 rate, int |
SPEC95 rate, fp |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| T520 | 5.2 | 1-CPU: 47.2 2-CPU: 93.8 4-CPU: 186 8-CPU: 363 12-CPU: 531 |
||||
| T600 | 11.8 | 14.9 | 1-CPU: 106 2-CPU: 211 4-CPU: 418 6-CPU: 617 8-CPU: 814 10-CPU: 1003 12-CPU: 1192 |
1-CPU: 134 2-CPU: 263 4-CPU: 510 6-CPU: 735 8-CPU: 915 10-CPU: 1043 12-CPU: 1151 |
Compare these with other results on the Benchmarks page.
Physical dimensions
- Single-bay cabinet
- 1620×750×905 mm height/width/depth
- Weight of 360kg fully-loaded
- Power system can deliver up to almost 4,000W