PA-RISC information - since 1999

HP 9000 and PA-RISC Story

HP Unix Servers
Unix servers © HP 1980s

HP 9000 was a family of technical servers and workstations produced by HP between the 1980s and 2000s, which included several ranges of Unix computers: the HP 9000 700, 800 and others, based on HP PA-RISC, Itanium and other platform.

Both RISC and Unix were developed into products during the 1980s, moving from academia via industrial R&D to productization — at a time when much computing was still done on mainframes, minicomputers and time-sharing machines such as DEC PDP, VAX, IBM AS/400 and System/360.

HP 9000 and PA-RISC were HP’s new line of products in that fledging market in the early 1980s. This page focuses on the PA-RISC part of the story, divided into four periods from the 1980s to the 2000s that each featured distinct designs.

Phase Workstations Servers Mainframes Others
Prelude: Early 1980s Other HP 9000
500 series		 Other HP 9000
200, 300 series
Infancy: Late 1980s
Phase I		 HP 9000 800
840 to 870, 600		 Other HP 9000
Apollo, 400
Growth: 32-bit 1990s
Phase II		 HP 9000 700
720-750, 705-725
US Navy
DTC, TAC-3, TAC-4		 HP 9000 800
F/G/H/I-Class		 Mainframes
890		 HP VME industrial
742, 745i, 747i
Third party PRO
Hitachi, NEC, Japan
Maturity: 90s heydays
Phase III		 HP 9000 700
712 and 715
HP Visualize
B/C/J-Class		 HP 9000 800
E-Class
Lettered servers
A/D/K/L/N/R-Class		 Mainframes
Convex
T/V-Class		 HP VME industrial
743, 744, 745, 748
Portables
SAIC, RDI, Hitachi
Decline: 64-bit 2000s
Phase IV		 HP Itanium
zx workstations		 HP Integrity
rp servers
HP Itanium
rx servers		 Mainframes
Superdome

This article attempts to unify all the different streams of HP 9000 and PA-RISC into a single story, with simplifications. Release dates of HP 9000 computers and market entry prices are listed in the PA-RISC Timeline. Much more details on HP 9000 PA-RISC systems are described in PA-RISC Computers.

Separate articles describe the history of PA-RISC operating systems, the era of PA-RISC processors as well as the age of PA-RISC information and OpenPA itself.

Prelude to PA-RISC – Early 1980s

The prelude to PA-RISC computers took place during the early to mid-1980s, starting with the 1982 HP FOCUS computers.

In the early 1980s, HP worked on both Unix and RISC development and products. Before PA-RISC, the original HP 9000 series was released with the FOCUS-based 500 series (9020). In parallel, the Motorola 68000 were added as HP Unix workstations.

Other HP 9000

There were a few other computer series offered under the HP 9000 label before HP released PA-RISC computers. This includes early HP Unix platforms based on Motorola 68000 CISC processors, the HP FOCUS line that preceeded PA-RISC and HP 3000 minicomputers, which only later switched to PA-RISC.

Early HP 9000 Computers
Early HP 9000 © HP 1980s

HP 9000 200 were the earliest incarnations of HP Unix platforms, based on Motorola 68000. They started life as HP 9826 in 1981 and were soon followed by other high-end technical desktops, such as the HP 9836, 9816, 9920, 9817 and 9837H. HP renamed the series in the early 1980s to HP 9000 200 and the individual computers to HP 9000/220 and so on. The HP 9000 200 ran versions of HP-UX Unix.

The other series based on Motorola M68k processors were HP 9000 300, sold from the mid-1980s to the early 1990s as HP Unix platform. HP 9000 300 had a new, functional multi-box design for each computer, later used in first HP 9000 700 workstations. HP 9000 300 series used Motorola CISC processors from 68010 to 68040. Besides HP-UX, the 300 series were supported by a variety of BSD operating systems from the 1980s well into the 2010s, including the mythical 4.4BSD and the OpenBSD/hp300 and NetBSD/hp300 siblings.

HP 9000 500: HP 520 computers were the early-1980s predecessors of PA-RISC that started the HP 9000 series. HP 9000 500 were based on the proprietary HP 32-bit processor the HP FOCUS. First released in 1982, HP 9000/520, originally 9020, were quickly followed by HP 9000 530, 540 and 550 computers. Operating system support was limited to HP-UX, which on HP FOCUS allegedly was the first commercial Unix supporting a multi-processor, multi-user system.

HP 3000 were HP business minicomputers, first released in 1972, with MPE operating system, application stack and distinct customer base. For more information see 3000-MPE from hpmuseum.net and History of the HP 3000 from Bob Green.

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Infancy (I) – Late 1980s

The infancy of PA-RISC were the yeats between 1986 and the late 1980s with first PA-RISC processor and products, using an RISC architecture still in flux.

HP moved into the fledging microcomputer market in the late 80s with several differently positioned platforms. PA-RISC computers in the HP 9000 Series 800 were HP’s RISC entry into that market. HP 9000 offerings with CISC processors were sold by HP in parallel for almost a decade. PA-RISC 9000 800 were initially offered as servers for business applications but quickly adapted by HP and customers for technical and engineering – as early workstations.

HP experimented with and developed several processor, fabrication and systems designs in the those late-1980s days with the HP 9000 800, setting the scene for later HP 9000 700.

Early RISC computers and 800s

Early HP 9000 RISC
HP 9000 RISC computers © HP 1980s

HP 9000 800 servers were the original PA-RISC computers developed by HP in the 1980s and released in mid-1980s. They consisted of several computers based on 32-bit PA-RISC 1.0 and 1.1 processors and different designs. System architecture was rather divergent to later 700 workstations with different chipsets, buses and I/O devices. The HP 9000 700 series was introduced slightly later than the 800s, with a different, more workstation-centric focus.

Due to their separate system design and usage, HP 9000 700 and 800 series used different HP-UX Unix versions for a long time until HP-UX 10.20. Support for 800 series in open source systems was always limited due to sparse documentation on their architecture. Series 800 PA-RISC servers carried over into the Lettered servers of the A/D/K/N classes that kept a divergent architecture to 700 and Visualize workstations, focused on multi-user business applications.

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Other HP 9000

Just before releasing the HP 9000 700 line, HP bought Apollo, a technical computing market leader of the 80s, with their own PRISM (RISC)-based Domain 10000 workstations. Apollo Domain workstations were carried on for a few years under HP branding. HP integrated Apollo as their workstation business unit with Apollo co-branding on HP 9000 RISC workstations for a while, but Apollo products and technology were phased out soon after so HP could concentrate on PA-RISC.

HP 9000 400 were related to the HP 9000 300 series from the early 1980s but incorporated technology from acquired Apollo Computers. They were based on Motorola 68030 and 68040 processors and ran HP-UX and Domain/OS (Apollo Unix). HP 9000 400 were sold in parallel to 700 and 800 PA-RISC computers in the early 1990s and were widely supported by BSD and open source operating systems of that era. Designs, devices and peripherals were shared between Motorola 68000-based 400 series and PA-RISC 700 and 800 series, including SGC and EISA buses, SCSI controllers, HP-HIL and HP-IB peripherals and graphics.

From the late 1980s on, HP 3000 moved to the PA-RISC platform and used systems that were closely based on the HP 9000 800 series. HP 3000 used PA-RISC actually earlier than the widely-popular HP 9000 700 workstation series. The first MPE for PA-RISC release was MPE/XL, the last MPE version was MPE/iX with limited Unix support and POSIX compliance. HP 3000 and MPE have been discontinued since.

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Growth (II) – 32-bit 1990s

Much of the growth phase of HP 9000 and PA-RISC happened between 1990 and 1992. PA-RISC computers became very successful in the industry, and HP started differentiating its PA-RISC product ecosystem from large main-frame servers to small desktop workstations on Unix.

HP 9000 Family
© Hewlett Packard

HP introduced a dedicated PA-RISC workstation line, the HP 9000 700 series, to segment PA-RISC computers from the 800 servers. Based on new PA-RISC 1.1 processors, the original HP 9000 workstation line-up consisted of HP 9000 Snakes, smaller systems (705/710) and technical desktops (715/725)

These first HP 9000 workstations were often used for Unix-based graphics, engineering and R&D. Some opening up of the tightly-controlled PA-RISC happened with the HP PRO organization and third-party systems so PA-RISC was not limited to HP anymore.

HP 9000 700 workstations

HP 9000 Snakes Workstations
HP 9000 Snakes, © Unix World 1991

A large range of PA-RISC workstations was sold by HP with the HP 9000 700 series, from the 1990s on. The 700 series soon became popular 32-bit Unix RISC workstations and used HP’s new processors like the PA-7000, PA-7100 and (later) PA-7100LC.

At that time, much technical computing centered on Unix and RISC workstations, superseding older CISC computers. The new workstations were often used for CAD, CAM and specialized software for HP-UX or Unix. HP acquired Apollo Computers around that time, so Apollo technology and name became part of some workstations like HP Apollo 9000.

PA-RISC 700 workstations gained wide popularity in engineering, industrial and academic fields during the 1990s. During that time, PA-RISC and 700 workstations traded the performance crown of Unix and RISC computers frequently with DEC Alpha architecture. PA-RISC workstations were developed by the HP Workstation Systems Division in Ft. Collins, Colorado, USA. HP developed almost all PA-RISC CPUs since 1986 inhouse, in its VLSI Technology Center (VTC) and Systems & VLSI Technology Operation (SVTO), also in Fort Collins.

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HP 9000 800 servers

F/G/H/I-Class: These were the second generation HP 9000 800 servers from the early-1990s. The HP 9000 Nova servers share a similar, distinct 32-bit PA-RISC design. They had wildly diverse configurations for server applications from the small F10 to the large I70.

HP 9000 890: 890 servers were an early iteration of the T-Class mainframe architecture, with later T500/T600 being updated sucessors. Even later, the 890/T-Class system design was discontinued in favor of more flexible Superdome systems.

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VME and Industrial

HP sold PA-RISC VME computers as HP 9000 740 series from the early to late 1990s. They were used for industrial, scientific and military data measurement and real time control applications, as single-board computers utilized the industrial-grade VME bus. Processors used were 32-bit PA-RISC PA-7100, PA-7100LC and PA-7300LC with HP LASI and ASP chipsets and custom HP VME design.

HP 9000 743 and 748 VME
HP 743 © 1997 Hewlett Packard

Operating systems for HP 9000 740 were HP-UX for Unix and HP-RT for real-time applications, with some support in open Source operating systems. They were used in a very wide variety of applications for industrial and scientific control and measurement, including by the US military.

HP 74x VME products were discontinued in 2002 as customers have migrated to new solutions and platforms more rapidly than anticipated with end of support 2007.

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Third party

Precision RISC Organisation (PRO) was a consortium formed by HP and Convex in 1992 to promote PA-RISC architecture. PA-RISC chips and designs were usually not sold on the market to third-parties, licensing and distribution was tightly controlled by HP to its partners in the PRO.

Some PRO members sold third party PA-RISC computers as OEM or relabeled HP 9000 systems from HP in their markets:

These computers were mostly sold in Japan and Korea, with very limited worldwide distribution. Their vendors soon lost interest in PA-RISC as part of the 2000s general RISC decline and HP’s Itanium transition plans.

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HP and the US Navy

During the 1980s and 1990s, HP was part of framework contracts with the US Navy to supply industrial computers and workstations for military uses and tactical decision support. These were some of the largest commercial contracts won by HP at the time for PA-RISC computers.

HP was part of at least three programs and contracts with the US Navy:

Desktop Tactical Computer (DTC-1)

This relationship started with DTC-1 program during the 1980s, where HP offered HP FOCUS based HP 9000 520C computers (HP 9020C) that were widely deployed through the US Navy. The 9020C was also part of the US Navy Joint Operational Tactical System, JTOS.

HP 9020C were pervasive in the 1980s throughout the navy, almost every tactical or fleet staff in the United States Navy had five or more HP 9000s, used for anti-submarine warfare, anti-air warfare, radar systems and communications. It apparently served on US nuclear submarines well into the 1990s.

Tactical Advanced Computer (TAC-3)

After losing out to Sun with the DTC-2 contract, HP won the newer TAC-3 and TAC-4 programs in the early to mid-90s and supplied a large range of PA-RISC computers for various uses at the US Navy and its vessels.

Used in TAC-3 for mission support and tactical use cases were HP Apollo and/or HP 9000 400 workstations (CISC) and HP 9000 720, 730 workstations. The HP 9000 720, 730 and 750 were widely used by the US Navy in TAC-3 for a variety of military applications, including electronic intelligence gathering (ELINT).

The HP 9000 735 were apparently used by the US Navy as part of the TAC-3 (Tactical Advanced Computer) framework, possibly as AN/TSQ-142 mission planning system (TEAMS) for the EA-6B and the 755 used in ATWCS for cruise missiles (Tomahawk).

Tactical Advanced Computer (TAC-4)

TAC-4, for which procurement started in 1993, was one of the company’s largest-ever federal contract at the time. As part of US Navy TAC-4, HP supplied PA-RISC workstations, software and infrastructure during the 1990s to the US Navy for measurement and control, including:

HP 9000 712 workstations were used widely as TAC-4 Desktop Computer throughout US Navy and military vessels. Visualize J-Class workstations were offered as part of a technology refreshment of TAC-4 in 1996. D-Class servers were offered as technology refreshment of TAC-4 in 1996, together with K-Class servers.

The 743i and 744 VME computers were used by the US Navy for tactical display and control applications, including the AN/UYQ-70 workstation aboard surface and submarine vessels and surveillance aircraft. With third-party VME devices and systems integrations, the 743i/744 were used with FDDI networking for this.

For environments where standard workstations were not robust enough, HP contracted SAIC to produce a ruggedized MIL-SPEC portable workstation for the Navy: the SAIC Galaxy 1100 based on HP 9000 712, built into a ruggedized case for portable military applications.

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Maturity (III) – 1990s heydays

The maturity of PA-RISC took place in the long-phase between 1994 to 2000 until the dot-com boom. HP designed many new and competitive PA-RISC products and implemented the transition from 32-bit to 64-bit computing. PA-RISC maturity included the last 32-bit workstations and new 64-bit PA-RISC when Unix was still popular.

HP 9000 712 HP 9000 715 HP 9000 B-Class HP 9000 J-Class
HP 9000 712, 715, B-Class and J-Class, © Copyright HP 1999

HP’ Unix and RISC line-up matured significantly during the 1990s, with many PA-RISC products released from small PA-RISC desktops to large server and mainframe-type computers. HP however used increasingly complex and modern branding and product groups — HP 9000 700, HP Visualize, HP Integrity with the various lettered workstations and server series like A-Class, B-Class, J-Class.

PA-RISC moved from 32-bit to 64-bit computing in the 1990s with new PA-8000 processors, improved up to the PA-8800 in the 2000s. These were fairly high-powered Unix systems for the niche HP-UX technical and business market. Commodity and mainstream alternatives to RISC and Unix slowly started to appear at the end of that era with Window NT, Linux and faster x86 computers.

HP 9000 700 workstations

HP released very popular PA-RISC workstations in the HP 9000 700 range in 1994 and 1995, before moving PA-RISC to its Visualize branding.

HP Graphics
© Hewlett Packard 1996

Pizzabox 712 and newer 715: PA-RISC computer design was updated in 1994 with the HP 9000/712 and newer 715 workstations, based on the modern, integrated PA-7100LC processor and LASI chipset.

HP 9000 712 were a revolutionary pizza-box design that offered the advantages of a commercial Unix system on a RISC platform in a very small case (something Apple did a decade later again).

HP 9000 715 were updated with this newer 712 design, enabling a significant performance boost for the venerable 32-bit 715 workhorses. Both 712 and 715 were used a lot for CAD and graphics of the mid-199s, and were later on popular choices for Unix and open source development.

Visualize workstations

Starting in the mid-1990s, HP started called its PA-RISC workstations HP Visualize and gave them lettered names: B-Class, C-Class and J-Class. Formally they were still part of the 9000 700 workstation series but marketed with different branding to focus on their preferred applications and use cases.

HP Visualize Workstations
© Hewlett Packard 2001

Visualize workstations were geared towards graphics and engineering applications such as CAD or CAM and often used with HP’s powerful Visualize and Visualize-FX graphics adapters. Processors were the whole range of PA-RISC CPUs from 32-bit PA-7200 up to 64-bit PA-8900.

HP transitioned its PA-RISC workstations from traditional beige technical (desktop and tower) computers to more modern, dark-grey mini-towers, used throughout the HP Visualize branding.

Around 1997, due to competition and a changing market place, HP started aggressively repricing its HP 9000 and Visualize workstations with price drops of more than a third, to compete with Sun Ultra 1 and SGI Indigo2 workstations.

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Laptops and Portables

Very few portable PA-RISC workstations were produced during the 1990s — all by third-party vendors utilizing existing HP 9000 workstation designs from that era. First, there were the military-focused SAIC Galaxy 1100 and Talon portables from 1994, based on HP 9000 712 workstations and available through the Navy TAC-4 program. Very rare computers almost completely used in the military.

At the end of the 1990s, there were the RDI PrecisionBooks, real laptops based on HP Visualize C132L workstations designed into a military-focused portable system by RDI, later acquired by Tadpole. They did not enjoy widespread success.

In the mid-1990s, Hitachi of Japan designed another PA-RISC portable, the 3050RX/100C for the Japanese market, based on the Hitachi PA/50L processor.

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Lettered servers

Like its PA-RISC workstations, HP renamed HP 9000 servers to lettered designators that now included a spectrum of different 32- and 64-bit PA-RISC computers. PA-RISC servers were quite powerful at the time of the 1990s with a multitude of configurations and designs, from small A-Class to mid-size D-Class and cabinet-sized K-Class for various technical and business computing needs.

Early in this phase, HP still sold Unix servers under traditional HP 9000 800 branding:

During that time, system architecture between HP 9000 700 workstations and 800 servers began to converge, only to start diverging again in the late-1990s with the Cell and Stretch architectures, when HP moved to hardware virtualization.

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Mainframes

HP Exemplar
HP Exemplar © Hewlett Packard 1997

PA-RISC mainframes include all larger HP PA-RISC computers with a large amount of computing resources in multi-processor or cluster-type systems. Some were HP’s own development, like the T-Class, an outgrow of the original 800 series servers, and the modern cell-based Superdome.

Others mainframes were either co-developed or acquired externally, like the SPP Exemplar architecture from Convex, with which HP partnered as reseller in 1994 before buying them outright in 1995.

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Decline (IV) – 64-bit in the 2000s

HP slowly transitioned to the post-RISC phase in the 2000s with the long-planned move to the revolutionary Itanium IA64 VLIW architecture for its technical and Unix offerings. The decline of PA-RISC was set in stone much earlier than that, with the mid-1990s joint development of Itanium (EPIC) together with Intel after decades of (V)LIW architecture research at HP.

HP assumed RISC architectures had run its course and a new approach to processor and instruction architecture was needed to improve performance. This turned out to be true eventually, but the solution was not mainstream VLIW implementations like Itanium, but something much different.

Back to PA-RISC at the turn of the century.

Starting in the late 1980s, PA-RISC systems often wore the crown of fastest technical RISC and Unix workstations. This went on until the heydays of the 1990s, albeit at boutique prices. Mainstream x86 computers and operating systems became more performant during that era, becoming a serious and affordable alternative.

PA-RISC was slowly relegated to a niche market in the 2000s with the rp Integrity PA-RISC servers, after losing most technical workstation business. Soon after, as a result of a changing market environment and challenging business decisions after the dot-com bust, PA-RISC slowly was phased out of the technical HP line-up. Itanium products took over for a few years and after that turned out to be infeasible too, HP switched most technical computing to mainstream x86 computers.

Integrity servers

HP renamed its PA-RISC servers in the early 2000s to rp servers and shifted the focus of its PA-RISC platform towards servers. HP rp servers were based on 64-bit PA-RISC processors from the PA-8500 to the PA-8800, all multi-processor. Only the first rp branded systems shared design features with prior workstations and older servers, while the rest were new, server-only designs.

With rp servers HP moved its PA-RISC offering closer to new Itanium rx server architecture. Products and their technical design was similar between rp and rx. PA-RISC rp moved strongly towards Itanium with zx1 chipsets and upgrade paths to IA64 processors. HP rp servers were the last in two decades of PA-RISC servers.

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Itanium

Around the turn of the century, HP started to offer servers and workstations based on Itanium IA64 technology, a VLIW architecture jointly designed with Intel. System architecture in PA-RISC rp and IA64 rx servers converged and Itanium slowly phased out PA-RISC from HP’s technical and Unix lineup around 2002.

HP Integrity
© Hewlett Packard 2004

However, this happened at least half a decade later than HP originally planned – the transition from PA-RISC to Itanium is inevitable, as HP put it. To convince hesitant PA-RISC holdouts to make the move, HP claimed Itanium is really the evolutionary successor to PA-RISC and PA-RISC lives on in the IPF architecture with HP Unix servers reflect our smooth evolutionary philosophy admirably.

This marked the end of the PA-RISC platform at HP, with diminishing market share until the mid-2000s. The process of the long decline of RISC and commercial Unix servers was already underway then, with Unix relegated to special applications and later to high-end, mission-critical servers. HP started withdrawing from Unix workstations before Itanium, but pared down its offering even further with IA64.

HP Itanium
© Hewlett Packard 2001

Shipments of Itanium workstations ceased two years after release, at the time when Intel moved the x86 architecture to 64-bit. Originally envisaged as an industry-changing architecture, Itanium ended up as alternative to other RISC platforms it was meant to replace, and marked the end-phase of HP Unix and RISC platforms. Support for Itanium on Linux was also ended with Linux 6.7 in 2024.

On a side tangent of history, HP inherited both DEC Alpha RISC and OpenVMS through its acquisition of Compaq in early 2002, both had been rivals for HP platforms for decades. After discontinuing DEC Alpha, OpenVMS was to find a new home with the Itanium platform at HP, to which it was ported around 2005 to run on HP rx servers, being the first computers to offer both HP-UX and OpenVMS.

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Mainframe

Large computers were the last refuge of PA-RISC architecture in the late 2000s with the Superdome mainframe computers that utilized a similar (Cell) architecture as earlier rp and N-Class servers.

Superdome: The Superdome servers were a completely new design, for up to 64 processors per cabinet. The Superdome Legacy, or white systems, used a Cell crossbar chipset with 64-bit PA-RISC processors, while the newer Superdome sx1000 and sx2000, or black systems, used SX chipsets and a mixture of Itanium 2 processors. They all ran HP-UX and Linux, while the SX models also Windows and OpenVMS.

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Timeline

HP 9000 started as a family with HP 9000 500 in 1982, joined by PA-RISC with the 840 server in 1986, giving birth to the HP 9000 800 series of departmental servers. HP soon started to diversify its Unix and PA-RISC offerings and introduced the 700 series workstations, 740 series VME boards and in the mid-90s a large range of lettered computers (A-Class, J-Class ...) that were also marketed as Visualize and Integrity, then switching to rp and rx naming.

PA-RISC timeline, ∆ - workstation, █ - server, ∏ - rack
Year 500 600 700 740 800 Apollo A B C D E FGHI J K L N R rp rx SD T V
1982 ∆ █
1983
1984 █
1985
1986 █
1987 █
1988 █ █ ∆
1989 █ █
1990 █
1991 ∆ █ █
1992 ∆ ∏ █
1993 ∆ █ ∏
1994 ∆ ∏ █
1995 ∆ ∆ █ ∆ █ ∏
1996 ∏ ∆ ∆ █ ∆ █
1997 ∆ ∆ █ ∆ █ ∏ ∏
1998 ∏ █ ∏ ∏
1999 ∆ ∆ ∆ ∏ ∏ ∏ ∏
2000 ∏ ∆ ∆ ∆ ∏ ∏ ∏
2001 ∆ ∆ ∏
2002 ∏
2003 ∏ ∏ ∏
2004 ∆ ∏ ∏
2005 ∏
2006 ∏
2007 ∏ ∏
Year 500 600 700 740 800 Apollo A B C D E FGHI J K L N R rp rx SD T V

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Sources

The information on this page is based mostly on existing OpenPA content and includes new interpretation and other sources. Some pieces were sourced from the great HP Computer Museum, but also from news releases, journals or HP Labs.

Further reading

Pictures © Hewlett Packard, scans from product brochures, hpmuseum.net and 1000bit.it

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