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HP 9000/T500, T520, T600 and 890

Quick Facts
Introduced	1993, 95, 97
Period	Maturity (III)
Series	Mainframe
CPU	1-4 PCX 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
Design	Viper
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

The HP 9000 T-Class were PA-RISC high-end, datacenter-class servers from the 1990s, built with modular system cards for processors, memory or I/O devices. The 890, T500 and T520 used 32-bit PA-RISC architecture, while the design later on moved to 64-bit PA-RISC 2.0 with the T600.

HP marketed the T-Class as Corporate Business Servers that were the most capable and expandable UNIX-based systems with high-end performance scalability to meet growing business needs. Designed for business Unix applications and the corporate processing market of the 1990s, T-Class had massive expansion options for an Unix server of the time, for I/O and communications cards.

T500, T520, T600 and 890 share a similar system architecture with differences in specific processors and options. The main system backplane has sixteen slots, eight of which 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.

The HP 9000/890 was an earlier iteration of this mainframe architecture, based on the 1980s HP 9000 870 server and apparently used PA-RISC 1.0 PCX CPUs. Later T500/T600 were updated sucessors with newer technology and hardware. After the 64-bit T600, HP discontinued the T-Class design for mainframes in favor of the more flexible Cell-based Superdome systems.

System	Model number	Introduced	Price
890	HP 9000/890	1992	$340,000
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

Apparently 890 and T500 were board-upgradable to T520, with another board-upgrade path to PA-8000 processors as well.

System architecture

Processors

1. The 890 CPU is probably a PCX, other sources indicate a PA-7000
2. Large off-chip caches, especially on 890
3. T600 is apparently the only system with PA-8000 processor with L2 cache, which was not mentioned in the PA-8000 documentation

Model	CPU	Speed	L1 Cache	L2 Cache
890	1-4 PCX1	60 MHz	4 MB off-chip2
T500	1-12 PA-7100	90 MHz	2 MB off-chip
T520	1-14 PA-7150	120 MHz	2 MB off-chip
T600	1-12 PA-8000	180 MHz	2 MB off-chip	8 MB off-chip L23

Architecture

Processor cards attach processors and support chips to the main system bus in slots for processors, memory and I/O cards. The 890 and the T-Class have slighly different architecture.

9000/890

• Processor cards contain eight VLSI CMOS chips with the main processor and cache chips
  1. PCX PA-RISC 1.0 processor
  2. Cache chips ICMUX, DCMUX0 and DCMUX1 for 2 MB Instruction and 2 MB Data cache, ECC
  3. Floating point processor FPC, MUL and ADD
  4. Viper system bus VSC interface
• Up to four processor cards per system

The chip configuration looks like a PCX processor and the 890 is described as having a PA-RISC 1.0 processor. Some other parameters contradict this however, including the 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 cards in T500/T600 or seven in T520 per system
• Processor card chips:
  1. Two Viper system bus VSC interface
  2. Bus support chips
  3. T600 4 MB L2 I cache and 4 MB L2 D cache, each two modules
• Processor module chips:
  1. T520/T500 PA-7100 PA-RISC 1.1 processor
  2. T600 PA-8000 PA-RISC 1.1 processor
  3. 1 MB L1 I cache
  4. 1 MB L1 D cache

Chipset

Used chipsets depend the plug-in I/O cards and ordered options.

• 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

System buses

• PBus processor/memory bus, 60 MHz, 32-bit data path between single CPUs and their Viper main bus interfaces, that means 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
• T600 Runway CPU/memory bus, although not mentioned in documentation
• T600 GSC+ expansion bus in HSC variant
• HP-PB for up to 168 high-speed HP Precision Bus I/O channels with 1 GB/s throughput
• 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 up to 2 GB main memory
• T500/T520 up to 3.75 GB main memory
• T600 apparently up to 16 GB main memory

Expansion slots

• 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

Storage

• Drives located in external drive bays or racks
• T600 Marketed as up to 30TB with RAID arrays, huge amount for the time
• T500/T520 up to 20 TB with RAID

External ports

• SCSI-2 50-pin single-ended
• TP/RJ45 10BaseT 10 Mbit Ethernet
• Two serial RS232C DB9, one for console, one for USV
• Parallel DB25
• Two PS/2 connectors for keyboard und mouse

Operating systems

• 890 servers: HP-UX up to 10.20 for 800s servers.
• T-Class: HP-UX 10.20 for 800s servers, 11.00 and 11i v1

Benchmarks

Model	SPEC92 rate int	SPEC92 rate fp	SPEC95 int	SPEC95 fp	SPEC95 rate int	SPEC95 rate fp
890	1-CPU: 1215 2-CPU: 2253 3-CPU: 3306 4-CPU: 4301	1-CPU: 1180 2-CPU: 2360 3-CPU: 3529 4-CPU: 4685
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

Dimensions

Height	Width	Depth	Weight
1620mm	750mm	905mm	360kg

References

Manuals

• CE Handbook HP 3000 99x Family, HP T-Class Family (URL gone)
• Installation Guide T-Class HP 3000 99x Family, HP 9000 Systems (URL gone)
• Operator’s Guide HP 3000 99x Family, HP 9000 T-Class Systems (URL gone)

Articles

• Corporate Business Servers: An Alternative to Mainframes for Business Computing (.pdf) Thomas B. Alexander et al (June 1994: Hewlett-Packard Journal)
• HEWLETT-PACKARD MOVES T-CLASS SERVERS UP TO PA-7150 RISCS, Computer Business Review September 1995
• Multiprocessor features of the HP Corporate Business Servers, K. Chan et al., Compcon 93
• HP T-Class Corporate Business Servers HP Computer Buyer’s Guide (archive.org mirror), Hewlett-Packard Company (1997: mirror accessed January 2024)

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OpenPA is an independent resource on PA-RISC computers, technology and operating systems, edited since 1999 by Paul Weissmann. He also publishes OpenKRITIS on critical infrastructures and Insel Westberlin, a Berlin archive. OpenPA is a registered serial publication, ISSN 1866-2757.

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