HP Visualize C132L, C160L Workstations

Quick Facts
Introduced 1996
Period Maturity (III)
Series Visualize
CPU PA-7300LC 32-bit
132-160 MHz
Cache 128 KB L1
1 MB L2
RAM 2 GB
Design LASI
Drives 3 SCSI
1 FD
Expansion 2 GSC/EISA
1 EISA/PCI
1 PCI
I/O Ethernet
EVC
2 SCSI
2 serial
parallel
2 PS/2
HIL
audio

HP Visualize C132L and C160L are entry-level PA-RISC Unix workstations with integrated, low-cost PA-7300LC processors and LASI chipset. C132L and C160L were close to the slightly older and less powerful C100/C110, which were PA-7200 based, and technically almost identical to the smaller and less expandable B132L/B160L workstations.

© Hewlett Packard 1999

HP marketed the PA-7300LC-based C160L workstations for MDA, EDA, GIS, or software development with outstanding graphics and compute performance in an affordable and expandable system.

A C180L version is mentioned in documentation but it is unclear if ever existed. The very rare PA-RISC laptops from RDI, PrecisionBooks from 1998, were technically based on Visualize C132L and C160L workstation designs in a mobile case.

Visualize C-Class have a similar case to that of the old HP 9000 735 workstation, built of interlocking modules for I/O board, MPU board. Very sturdy.

System

Processors

The external L2 cache SRAM is optional and installed in two DIMM slots next to the CPU socket with modules of equal size. Usually, systems come with two 512 KB modules ≡ 1 MB L2.
System CPU Speed L1 cache L2 cache
HP Visualize C132L PA-7300LC PA-RISC 32-bit 132 MHz 64/64 KB on-chip 1 MB off-chip
HP Visualize C160L PA-7300LC PA-RISC 32-bit 160 MHz 64/64 KB on-chip 1 MB off-chip

Chipset

HP Visualize C132L and C160L still use HP LASI, a custom and highly integrated HP chipset, which combines many functions and I/O on a single chip. Together with the on-CPU memory controller (MIOC), this resulted in a very integrated system design. For PA-7300LC-systems, HP extended the LASI design by a PCI bridge for more I/O device and updated a few faster onboard devices. 

  ______
 |ICache|
 |______|
 ___|_____ Mainbus ______
|PA-7300LC|__..___|Memory|
|_________|  ||   |______|
  __|___     ||
 |DCache|    ||    _ _ LASI ASIC _ _
 |______|    ||           ______
 _______     ||   |  ..__|i82596|___|_[10Mb Ethernet]
|Phantom|____||      ||  |______|
|_______|         |  ||   ______    |
    |                ||__|53C710|_____[8-bit SCSI-2]
    |__________.. |  ||  |______|   |
               ||____||   ____
 ________      || |  ||__|PS/2|_____|_[Keyboard/Mouse]
|WAX/EISA|_____||    ||  |____|
|________|     || |  ||   ______    |
    ||         ||    ||__|16550A|_____[1st Serial]   
 ___||____     || |  ||  |______|   |
|EISA-slot|    ||    ||   ______
|_________|    || |  ||__|37C65C|___|_[Floppy]
 ___||____     ||    ||  |______|
|EISA-slot|    || |  ||   ______    |
|_________|    ||    ||__|16C522|_____[Parallel]
 ___||____     || |  ||  |______|   |
|EISA-slot|    ||    ||   _______
|_________|    || |  ||__|Harmony|__|_[Audio]
 ________      ||    ||  |_______|
|GSC-slot|_____|| |  ||   ___       |
|________|     ||    ||__|RTC|
 ________      || | GSC  |___|      |
|GSC-slot|_____||  _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
|________|     ||   ______
 ________      ||__|53C720|___________[16-bit SCSI-2]
|PCI-slot|__.. ||  |______|
|________|  || ||   ___________
 ________   || ||__|VisualizeEG|______[VGA]
|PCI-slot|__|| ||  |___________|
|________|  || ||
  ..________|| ||  _ _ WAX ASIC_ _ _
 _||_      PCI || |                 |
|Dino|_________||         ______
|____|         || |  ..__|16550A|___|_[2nd Serial]
               ||____||  |______|
              GSC |  ||   ___       |
                     ||__|HIL|________[Input]
                  | GSC  |___|      |
                   _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

HP Visualize C130L/C160L System Architecture

System buses

Expansion

Memory

Expansion cards

Storage

Ports

Operating systems

Performance

PA-RISC SPEC scores of HP 9000 computers
System CPU SPEC95
int		 SPEC95
fp		 SPEC95
rate int		 SPEC95
rate fp
HP Visualize C132L PA-7300LC 132 MHz 6.45 6.70 58.1 60.3
HP Visualize C160L PA-7300LC 160 MHz 7.75 7.56 7.75/7.56 69.7/68.1

Compared to other RISC and Unix platforms of the 1990s, PA-RISC was a fast architecture with PA-7300LC processors being solid mid-1990s low-cost RISC processors.

Based on old SPEC95 archives
System CPU SPEC95
int		 SPEC95
fp
HP Visualize C240 PA-8200 236 MHz 17.10 25.40
HP Visualize C160 PA-8000 160 MHz 10.40 16.30
SGI O2 MIPS R10000 196MHz 10.10 8.77
Intel SE440BX Intel Pentium II 233MHz 9.38 7.40
IBM RS/6000 F50 PowerPC 604e 166 MHz 7.52 8.52
DEC Alphastation 600 DEC Alpha 21164 300MHz 7.33 12.2
Intel Alder Intel Pentium Pro 166MHz 7.11 6.21
Sun Ultra 2 1170 Sun UltraSPARC 167MHz 6.34 9.33
HP 9000 C110 PA-7200 120 MHz 6.00 8.14
SGI Indy MIPS R5000 150MHz 3.97 4.20
HP 9000 712/100 PA-7100LC 100 MHz 3.76 4.06

Dimensions

Height Width Depth Weight
138mm 539mm 447mm 21kg

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.

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