HP 9000 705 and 710

Quick Facts
Introduced	1992
Period	Growth (II)
Series	700 Series
CPU	PA-7000 35/50 MHz
Caches	96 KB
RAM	64 MB
Design	ASP
Drives	2 SCSI
Expansion	None
I/O	Ethernet SCSI 2 serial parallel VGA HIL audio

HP 9000/705 and HP 9000/710 were the first small PA-RISC workstations, released in 1992. They are simplified versions of the Snakes 720, 730 and 750 workstations in a small case.

HP 710 — HP 9000 710, Thomas Schanz CC BY-SA 4.0

The basic HP 9000 technical workstation design was taken over with few changes:

Smaller instruction and data caches on the processor
Lower CPU clock rate
Different memory architecture
Integration of graphics, SCSI, Ethernet subsystem onto a single mainboard
Reduced expansion options
First audio capable Series 700 workstation

HP 9000 705 and 710 were marketed to compete in the early 1990s low-end workstation market. The competition between $5,000 and $10,000 were lower cost Sun Sparcstation IPX and from IBM RS/6000 220 for Unix.

HP 9000 705 were introduced in 1992 for $8,990
HP 9000 710 were introduced in 1992 for $12,490

HP introduced another pizzabox-sized workstation a few years later in 1994 with the HP 9000 712 workstation, based on newer 32-bit PA-7100LC processors.

System architecture

Processors

System	CPU	Speed	L1 cache
HP 9000 705	PA-7000 PA-RISC 32-bit	35 MHz	96 KB off-chip
HP 9000 710	PA-7000 PA-RISC 32-bit	50 MHz	96 KB off-chip

Chipset

HP ASP chipset, a custom HP RISC design
HP Viper memory and I/O controller, low-cost version implemented in two chips
NCR 53C700 8-bit single-ended SCSI-2
Intel 82596DX 10 Mbit Ethernet controller
Audio 8-bit mono PSB2160 CODEC
Other I/O (serial, parallel, i8042)
HP Stinger (?) CRX graphics, 8-bit

System buses

PBus processor/memory bus, 200 MB/s at 50 MHz (710), 140 MB/s at 35 MHz (705)
VSC main system bus, 100 MB/s at 25 MHz (710), 70 MB/s at 17.5 MHz (705)
GSC system-level I/O bus
SCSI-2 narrow single-ended bus

Memory

HP-proprietary 72-pin SIMMs
Eight sockets
16 MB (4×4) minimum, 64 MB maximum

Memory has to installed in quartets:
first in the even slots (0, 2, 4, 6), then in the odd slots (1, 3, 5, 7):

	    front
.~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~.
|  ext.      int.       ###|
|  drive     drive      ###|
|                       ###|
|                       ###|
|                       ###|
| 3 x-----x  7 x-----x  ###|
| 2 x-----x  6 x-----x  ###|
| 1 x-----x  5 x-----x  ###|
| 0 x-----x  4 x-----x  ###|
 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
	     back

Expansion slots

No expansion slots

Storage

SCSI 3.5″ 50-pin Narrow SE hard drive
SCSI half-height 5.25″ 50-pin Narrow SE drive, external accessible

External ports

SCSI-2 50-pin single-ended
Two serial RS232C DB9
Parallel DB25
15-pin AUI 10 Mbit & 10Base2 BNC Ethernet
VGA HD15
HP-HIL connector for input devices
Two phone jacks (microphone, headphones)
Nine LEDs on the front for errors and status messages

Operating systems

HP-UX, the original HP Unix shipped with it
- 8.0: 32-bit, from version 8.07, pre-Y2K
- 9.0, pre-Y2K
- HP-UX 10.20 32-bit
- HP-UX 11.00 could work in 32-bit mode (but unsupported and slow)
PA-RISC Linux, main Linux port to PA-RISC, supported by HP in the 2000s
OpenBSD, open-source Unix-like, ported to PA-RISC
NetBSD, open-source Unix-like, ported to PA-RISC
Research: HPBSD, original 4.3BSD on PA-RISC
Research: Mach 4/Lites, microkernel with 4.4BSD
Research: MkLinux, Linux with Mach microkernel
(710 only) Research: OSF MK-PA, OSF/1 Unix port to PA-RISC

Pictures

HP 9000 710, Thomas Schanz 2010, CC BY-SA 4.0

Benchmarks

System	CPU	SPEC92 int	SPEC92 fp	SPEC95 int	SPEC95 fp
HP 9000 705	PA-7000 35 MHz	21.9	33.0
HP 9000 710	PA-7000 50 MHz	31.6	47.6	0.99	1.44

Comparison to SPEC benchmark data from other contemporary Unix workstations. HP 9000 705 and 710 were slightly slower than a higher-clocked Intel 486DX2 but much faster in floating point, even beating an Intel Pentium.

Based on old SPEC92 and SPEC95 archives
System	CPU	SPEC92 int	SPEC92 fp	SPEC95 int	SPEC95 fp
Intel Xpress	Intel Pentium 75MHz	89.1	68.5	2.31	2.02
DEC AlphaStation 200	DEC Alpha 21064 100MHz	74.6	95.2	1.48	2.79
Sun SPARCstation 10	Sun SuperSPARC 40MHz	50.2	60.2	1.13	1.38
Digital DECstation 5000	MIPS R4000 50MHz	43.2	42.1
IBM RS/6000 355	IBM POWER 41MHz	40.7	83.3
Siemens PCE-4C	Intel 486DX2 66MHz	35.8	16.1
Motorola 8000	Motorola 88100 33MHz	27.7	18.8
DEC 5000/33	MIPS R3000 33MHz	20.9	23.4
HP 9000 425e	Motorola 68040 25MHz	12.2	9.3
Digital VAX4000	DEC KA46 22MHz	11.1	12.6

Documentation

Manuals

HP 9000 Series 700 Model 705 and 710 Owner’s Guide, Hewlett Packard (January 1992, A1991-90608, edition E0192) hpmuseum

LED messages

LED errors and status messages might be displayed on the HP 9000 705/710 front LEDs

Product sheets

Introducing the Model 705 Colour workstation, The power you need, Hewlett Packard (January 1992, A1991-90608, edition E0192) hpmuseum
HP Apollo Series 700 Model 710 Workstation, product brief, Hewlett Packard (January 1992, 5091-3183E) hpmuseum

Articles

High-Performance Design for Low-Cost PA-RISC Desktops (.pdf) pp. 55-63 Craig Fink et al (August 1992: Hewlett-Packard Journal) archive.org
Hewlett unveils low-cost workstations, UPI Archives, May 12 1992
New high-performance HP Apollo 9000 Series 700 workstations, HP Computer Update, HP, December 1992 hpmuseum
Introducing the new HP Apollo 9000 Models 705 and 710 with breakthrough engineering and high-performance graphics, HP Computer Update, HP, Januar 1992 hpmuseum
HP Apollo Series 700 Performance Brief, Hewlett Packard (n.d., no #) hpmuseum

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