Third Party PA-RISC Systems
PA-RISC in East Asia
Not only HP sold PA-RISC computers in the golden decade of Unix RISC workstations in the 90s. Several third party vendors organized in the Precision RISC Organisation (PRO) sold rebadged HP 9000 computers in East Asia in the mid-1990s or developed custom PA-RISC platforms.
- Hitachi sold custom 3050RX and 3500 PA-RISC workstations and servers with HP CPUs and relabeled HP 9000 systems as OEM, the 9000V series. Hitachi also developed own PA-RISC processors, the PA/50 and HARP-1, used in some specific Hitachi computers.
- Mitsubishi marketed the original HP 9000 720, 730 and 750 in the early-1990s as MELCOM ME RISC and sold them in Japan.
- NEC was very active in PRO with the NX7000 and TX7 ranges of PA-RISC computers that were based off OEM rebranded D, K, L, S and T-Class.
- OKI offered a large range of HP 9000 PA-RISC servers and workstations, OEM rebranded as OKITAC 9000 series. In its semiconductor business, OKI also developed a custom PA-RISC processor, the OP32 for embedded devices.
- Samsung marketed rebadged HP 9000 715 workstations in Korea.
These computers were shipped with Unix operating systems, geared towards technical and scientific users. Vendors either licensed HP-UX Unix directly or slightly modified it like Hitachi with HI-UX/WE2 and HI-UX/MPP or Samsung with SS-UX (?). Documentation on these computers and software is almost nonexistent, few sources describe them at all, except some press releases.
Hitachi
Hitachi and HP had a long-term
alliance since 1989 that included joint PA-RISC development even before HP opened up the PA-RISC alliance with the PRO consortium in the 1990s.
Hitachi even designed their own PA-RISC processors, PA/50 and HARP.
Hitachi then built several lines of computers with PA-RISC processors as part of that consortium over the next years: custom workstations (3050RX) and servers (3500) for HI-UX/WE2, and rebadged HP 9000, sold in Japan as Hitachi 9000V with HP-UX, and the SR2 supercomputers with HI-UX/MPP.
Hitachi 3050RX workstations
Hitachi designed a range of custom PA-RISC workstations for the Japanese market in the 90s.
These very rare systems were apparently marketed as Hitachi Creative Station 3050RX Group
and ran HI-UX/WE2, the Hitachi HP-UX variant.
The 3050RX 200 was billed as one the industry’s cheapest Unix workstations with a harddisk
at time of release in 1993.
| System | Processor | Cache | RAM | Expansion |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 3050RX/100C | Hitachi PA/50L 33MHz | 8/4KB | 80MB | 10.4", 1024x768 TFT |
| 3050RX/200 | Hitachi PA/50M 33MHz | 8/4KB | 144MB | $6.190 |
| 3050RX/220 | PA-7100 50MHz | 64/64KB | 192MB | none |
| 3050RX/220 | PA-7100LC 60MHz | 256KB | ? | ? |
| 3050RX/230 | PA-7100 80MHz | 256/256KB | 192MB | none |
| 3050RX/235 | PA-7100LC 80MHz | 512KB | ? | ? |
| 3050RX/255 | PA-7300LC 132MHz | 64/64KB L1 (1MB L2) |
256MB | Two slots |
| 3050RX/310S | PA-7100 33/40MHz | 64/64KB L1 | 272MB | One slot |
| 3050RX/320 | PA-7100 50MHz | 64/64KB L1 | 416MB | Three slots |
| 3050RX/320G | PA-7100 50MHz | 64/64KB L1 | 192MB | Three slots |
| 3050RX/320S | PA-7100 50MHz | 64/64KB L1 | 272MB | One slot |
| 3050RX/330 | PA-7100 80MHz | 256/256KB | 416MB | Three slots |
| 3050RX/330G | PA-7100 80MHz | 256/256KB | 192MB | Three slots |
| 3050RX/330T | PA-7100 80MHz | 256/256KB | 192MB | Three slots |
| 3050RX/330 | PA-7100 100MHz | 256/256KB L1 | 416MB | Three slots |
| 3050RX/355E | PA-7300LC 132MHz | 64/64KB L1 (1MB L2) |
1.5GB | Two slots one audio |
| 3050RX/365 | PA-7300LC 160MHz | 64/64KB L1 (1MB L2) |
1.5GB | Two slots one audio |
| 3050RX/430 | PA-7100 80MHz | 256/256KB L1 | 768MB | Seven slots |
| 3050RX/440 | PA-7100 100MHz | 256/256KB L1 | 768MB | Seven slots |
| 3050RX/535 | PA-7100LC 80MHz | 512KB L1 | ? | ? |
Hitachi 3500 servers
Hitachi also sold specially branded servers, the 3500, in 1993, which were equivally rare as the 3500RX workstations and also ran HI-UX/WE2, Hitachi’s HP-UX variant.
| System | Processor | Cache | RAM | Expansion |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 3500/310 | PA-7100 50MHz | 64/64KB | 416MB | ? |
| 3500/410 | PA-7100 50MHz | 64/64KB | 512MB | ? |
| 3500/510 | PA-7100 50MHz | 64/64KB | 512MB | ? |
| 3500/520 | PA-7100 50MHz | 256/256KB | 512MB | ? |
| 3500/530 | PA-7100 80MHz | 256/256KB | 512MB | ? |
| 3500/540 | PA-7100 100MHz | 256/256KB | 512MB | ? |
| 3500/630 | PA-7100 80MHz | 256/256KB | 1024MB | ? |
| 3500/640 | PA-7100 100MHz | 256/256KB | 1024MB | ? |
Hitachi 9000V OEM systems
Hitachi also sold a line of original HP systems as OEM (probably only in Japan) — rebranded
as Hitachi 9000V series
which included the following systems from 1995 onwards:
| System | Processor | HP equivalent |
|---|---|---|
| 9000V V715/100XC, V715/100, V715/80, V715/64 | PA-7100LC | HP 9000/715 (newer models) |
| 9000V V715/100Tiny, V715/80Tiny | PA-7100LC | HP 9000/712 (probably) |
| 9000V V735/125 | PA-7150 | HP 9000 735/125 |
| 9000V VE55, VE45, VE35, VE25 | PA-7100LC | HP 9000/E-Class |
| 9000V VQ200, VQ210 | PA-7200 | HP 9000/J200, HP 9000/J210 |
| 9000V VR100, VR200, VR400 | PA-7200 | HP 9000/K100, HP 9000/K200, HP 9000/K400 |
| 9000V VT500 | 1-12 PA-7100 | HP 9000/T500 (T-Class) |
| 9000V VT600 | 1-12 PA-8000 | HP 9000/T600 (T-Class) |
| 9000V VT800 | 1-16 PA-8000 | might be based on HP S-Class |
Hitachi Supercomputers
Hitachi developed and produced a line of 32-bit supercomputers in the mid-1990s, based on its own PA-RISC chips utilizing a hyper (3-D) crossbar design, a distributed memory parallel system.
Both ran Hitachi HI-UX/MPP, an Unix with Mach 3.0 microkernel extensions, and were apparently rented or leased to customers, from 5 million yen per month.
The parallel SR2201 computer apparently won a 1995 Good Design Award
for product design of the mainframe.
Configurations were initially for up to 1024 processors, later extended to 2048 for the SR2201, which had several entries in the Top 500 HPC list in the late-1990s.
| System | CPU | SMP | Caches | RAM | Performance | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| SR2001 | Hitachi HARP-1 90MHz | 8-128 | 8/16KB L1 512/512KB L2 |
4GB | 23 GFLOP | |
| SR2201 | Hitachi HARP-1E 150MHz | 32-1024 | 8/16KB L1 512/512KB L2 |
256GB | 307 GFLOP | vector processing |
Peak performance was given as 614 GFlops for the 1024-processor configuration.
Mitsubishi
Mitsubishi Electric of Japan sold OEM rebranded HP 9000 workstations in the early 1990s as MELCOM ME RISC series
as part of the PRO consortium for PA-RISC OEMs.
Apparently three models were sold, all based on the original HP 9000 workstations 720, 730 and 750 (– some sources also mention an 705 and 710 equivalent).
The computers were marketed for graphical use cases with HP GRX and other high-end graphics adapters.
| System | Processor | HP equivalent | Price |
|---|---|---|---|
| ME/R7200 ME/S7200 |
PA-7000 50MHz | HP 9000/720 | $23,453 |
| ME/R7300 ME/S7300 |
PA-7000 66MHz | HP 9000/730 | |
| ME/R7500 ME/S7500 |
PA-7000 66MHz | HP 9000/750 |
Almost no information exists on Mitsubishi PA-RISC and MELCOM ME RISC apart from few press releases – these were probably not very widely sold.
NEC
NEC Electronics of Japan was also a Precision RISC Organization (PRO) member and actively sold PA-RISC computers marketed as TX7 in the mid-1990s mostly in Japan.
TX7 and NX7000 were often rebadged HP 9000 computers sold by NEC as OEM, with the custom P590 designed by NEC to fill the gap between D and K-Class
.
NEC PA-RISC computers ran licensed HP-UX Unix.
| System | Processor | SMP | HP equivalent | Price |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| NX7000/220 NX7000/420 |
PA-7200 160-180MHz | 1-4 | HP 9000/K-Class | ¥8,680,000 ¥12,160,000 |
| NX7000/27 NX7000/37 |
PA-8000 180MHz | 1-2 | HP 9000/D-Class | ¥4,000,000 ¥4,600,000 |
| NX7000/250 NX7000/260 NX7000/450 NX7000/460 |
PA-8000 160-180MHz | 1-4 | HP 9000/K-Class | ¥9,200,000 ¥10,600,000 ¥11,700,000 ¥13,200,000 |
| NX7000/500 | PA-7100 90MHz | 1-12 | HP 9000/T500 | |
| NX7000/520 | PA-7150 120MHz | 1-14 | HP 9000/T520 | ¥27,500,000 |
| NX7000/L1000 NX7000/L2000 NX7000/L3000 |
PA-8500 PA-8500 PA-8600 |
1-2 1-4 1-4 |
HP 9000 L1000 L2000 L3000 |
¥3,200,000 ¥4,300,000 |
| NX7000/PS200 | PA-8000 160-180MHz | 1-1024 | Custom or S-Class? | ¥36,000,000 |
| TX7/D280 | PA-8000 180MHz | HP 9000 D-Class | ¥4,700,000 | |
| TX7/K370 | PA-8200 200MHz | HP 9000 K-Class | ¥10,700,000 | |
| TX7/P590 | PA-8000 | 1-8 | Custom NEC | ¥17,600,000 |
| TX7/V2200 | PA-8200 200MHz | 4-16 | HP 9000/V2200 | ¥31,500,000 |
OKI
Similar to Mitsubishi in the early 1990s, Oki Electric Industry sold various PA-RISC
workstations and servers from HP rebranded as OEM systems.
These were integrated into the OKITAC
brand of OKI and shipped from 1992 onward mostly in Japan, running stock HP-UX.
| System | HP equivalent |
|---|---|
| OKITAC 9000/800 Series | HP 9000/800 Nova servers |
| OKITAC 9000 A Series | HP 9000/A180C |
| OKITAC 9000 B Series | HP Visualize B1000 |
| OKITAC 9000 C Series | HP Visualize C3000 |
| OKITAC 9000 D Series | HP 9000 D-Class |
| OKITAC 9000 J Series | HP Visualize J5000 |
| OKITAC 9000 K Series | HP 9000 K-Class |
| OKITAC 9000 R Series | HP 9000 R380 and R390 |
OKI also developed a custom PA-RISC processor in the 1990s as member of the Precision RISC Organization (PRO) consortium. This OP32 processor was not used in its own workstations, but geared towards embedded devices.
Samsung
Samsung Electronics produced and sold HP 9000 workstations under licence from 1993 on as part of the Precision RISC Organization, PRO.
Custom workstations systems were designed by the Samsung Workstation Division in San Jose, USA, running SS-UX
operating system with added I/O-features
to HP-UX Unix, which Samsung also licensed from HP.
| System | Processor | HP equivalent | Price |
|---|---|---|---|
| SWS715 | PA-7100 50MHz | HP 9000 715 | $14,000 |
| SWS715 | PA-7100 33MHz | HP 9000 715 | $4,000 |
Samsung intended to sell the SWS715 through indirect channels to non-HP partners, targeting imaging and scientific visualisation
, probably limited to the Korean market.
Press releases mention Samsung planning to develop its own PA-RISC processor, with integrated memory technology, and separately port or ship Microsoft Windows NT to its PA-RISC computers.
Documentation
Documentation on these computers and software is almost non-existent anymore, and few sources describe them at all, except some surviving press releases.
- IPSJ Computer Museum: 3050RX Hitachi Group/3500 Series, Information Processing Society of Japan (n.d. Accessed August 2008)
- The Hitachi SR2201 series, Overview of Recent Supercomputers, Aad van der Steen, October 2004
- The Hitachi SR2201 series, Overview of recent sup ercomputers, Aad van der Steen, NCF, September 1994 (PDF)
- HITACHI CLAIMS TO HAVE THE INDUSTRY’s CHEAPEST UNIX WORKSTATION, USING PRECISION ARCHITECTURE..., CBR Online Archive, 28 Oct 1993
- October 1993 PROgress Newsletter, USENET post, Google Archive, 11/01/1993
- SAMSUNG, WITH FIRST PA-RISC STATION, COMMITS TO NT, CBR Online Archive, 21 Marchs 1993
- MITSUBISHI DEMONSTRATES AGREEMENT WITH H-P, CBR Online Archive, 22 May 1991
- Main Specifications and Features of the TX7 Scalable Server Series, NEC Press Release December 1997
- Release of New Low-End Models of the NX7000 Series That Realize Double the Price-Performance of Current Models, NEC Press Release September 1999
- Main specifications of NX7000/L1000 and L2000, NEC Press Release September 1999
- NEC INTROS SCI/TECH SERVERS, PARTNERS WITH HP, HPC Wire, December 5, 1997
- NEC GETS EVEN FRIENDLIER WITH HP, CASTS DOUBT ON MIPS WORK, CBR Archive, December 7, 1997
- >NEC NX7000/500, Information Processing Society of Japan, n.d.
- Fujitsu to Enhance NX7000 Series with New Models and MPP Parallel Server Suitable for Building Large-Scale Decision Support Systems, NEC Press Release Januar 1996
- Release of three high-performance models of UNIX server NX7000 series, NEC Press Release March 1996
- Hitachi to Release High-end 9000V Series UNIX Server, Hitachi Press Release October 1997
- HP, HITACHI AND NEC TO BRING ENHANCED RESILIENCE FOR MISSION-CRITICAL APPLICATIONS TO ENTERPRISE COMPUTING, NEC Press Release October 1997
- Hitachi Released the VT800, the top model of the HITACHI 9000V series servers, Hitachi Press Release October 1997
- Launch of the massively parallel computer HITACHI SR2201, Hitachi Press Release July 1995
- The History of New HPC (No. 129), HPC Wire Japan 2023
- Massively parallel computer HITACHI SR2201" H-6A20, 1995 Good Design Award
- Hitachi Creative Station Pizza Box Model 3050RX/255、3050RX/215 (Japanese), Hitachi 1996
- Hitachi Creative Station Desktop Model 3050RX/365, 3050RX/355 (Japanese), Hitachi 1996