HP Visualize B1000, C3000, C3600, C3700

Quick Facts
Introduced 1999-2001
Period Maturity (III)
Series Visualize
CPU PA-8500 64-bit
PA-8600 64-bit
PA-8700+ 64-bit
300-875 MHz
Cache 1.5-2.25 MB L1
RAM 8 GB
Design Astro
Drives 2 SCSI
1 FD
1 IDE
Expansion 6 PCI
I/O 100E
2 SCSI
2 serial
parallel
2 USB
audio

HP Visualize B1000, C3000, C3600 and C3700 were late-1990s 64-bit PA-RISC workstations for the graphics and CAD on Unix markets. They used 64-bit HP PA-8500, PA-8600 and PA-8700 PA-RISC processors and were often used in technical design disciplines, before the market moved to Intel/Windows NT.

B1000 © HP 1999

System architecture with HP Astro and Elroy PA-RISC chipsets was a major change from earlier Visualize workstations with new I/O devices added and no more LASI chipset and GSC bus – staples of 1990s PA-RISC. PCI and USB appeared and Visualize workstations became slightly more PC-like.

C3700 © Hewlett Packard 2004

As part of the HP Unix PA-RISC workstations, Visualize B-Class and C-Class were sold until the early 2000s as some of the last PA-RISC desktop computers, the end of an era. B1000 were entry Visualize workstations whereas C3000 and C3600 were more powerful for 3D design.

HP B1000 and C3000 suceeded the popular Visualize C200 and C240 and were followed in 2004 by the last PA-RISC workstation, HP c8000 with 64-bit Mako dual-core processors.

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System

Processors

System CPU Speed L1 cache
HP Visualize B1000 PA-8500 PA-RISC 64-bit 300 MHz 512/1024 KB on-chip
HP Visualize C3000 PA-8500 PA-RISC 64-bit 400 MHz 512/1024 KB on-chip
HP Visualize C3600 PA-8600 PA-RISC 64-bit 552 MHz 512/1024 KB on-chip
HP Visualize C3650 PA-8700 PA-RISC 64-bit 625 MHz 768/1536 KB on-chip
HP Visualize C3700 PA-8700 PA-RISC 64-bit 750 MHz 768/1536 KB on-chip
HP Visualize C3750 PA-8700+ PA-RISC 64-bit 875 MHz 768/1536 KB on-chip

Chipset

System buses

Expansion

Memory

Expansion cards

Storage

Ports

Operating systems

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Pictures

HP Visualize C3700 HP Visualize C3700 HP Visualize C3700 HP Visualize C3700
HP Visualize C3700, Thomas Schanz 2013, CC BY-SA 4.0

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Dimensions

System Height Width Depth Weight
Desktop 445mm 229mm 495mm 25kg
Rack-mounted 6U 451mm 665mm 25kg

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Performance

HP Visualize B1000 and C3000 series with 64-bit PA-RISC processors were very fast Unix workstations at the turn of the century. They were usually faster than higher-clocked MIPS, Alpha, UltraSPARC and Intel computers from the same time, and significantly faster in floating point in SPEC benchmarks.

PA-RISC SPEC scores of HP 9000 computers
System CPU SPEC95
int/fp		 SPEC95
rate int/fp		 SPEC2000
int/fp		 SPEC2000
rate int/fp
HP Visualize B1000 PA-8500 300MHz 24.1 42.0 217 378
HP Visualize C3000 PA-8500 400MHz 31.8 52.4 287 471 313 321
HP Visualize C3600 PA-8600 552MHz 42.1 64.0 379 576 432 433 5.01 5.02
HP Visualize C3650 PA-8700 625MHz 508 542 5.89 6.29
HP Visualize C3700 PA-8700 750MHz 604 576 7.00 6.68
HP Visualize C3750 PA‑8700+ 875MHz 678 674
Based on old SPEC2000 archives
System Processor SPEC2000
int/fp		 SPEC2000
rate int/fp
HP c8000 PA-8800 1.0 GHz 1001
HP AlphaServer ES80 Alpha 21364 1.0GHz 761 1288 8.83 14.9
HP zx6000 2 McKinley 900MHz 669 1139 15.4 30.0
Sun Fire 280R 2 UltraSPARC III Cu 1GHz 511 688 11.7 14.1
SGI Origin 3200 4 MIPS R14000 600MHz 483 499 22.2 19.8
DELL Power Edge 4400 Pentium III Xeon 1 GHz 437 302 5.07 3.50
HP Visualize J5600 2 PA-8600 552 MHz 431 433 9.63 8.02
IBM RS/6000 M80 4 IBM RS64 IV 750MHz 409 359 18.7 15.7
HP A500 2 PA-8600 550MHz 406 389 9.3 7.6
AlphaStation XP1000 Alpha 21264A 667MHz 403 532 4.67 6.17
HP i2000 Merced 800MHz 4MB 365 610 7.6
HP Visualize P500 Intel Pentium III 500 231 191

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Documentation

Most HP documentation is only available at archive.org and other archives, with most official sources, articles and journals having disappeared in the 2010s.

ROM update

There is a firmware update available:

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