SPARCstation 10
Encyclopedia
The SPARCstation 10 is a workstation
computer
made by Sun Microsystems
. Announced in May 1992, it was Sun's first desktop multiprocessor (being housed in a pizza box form factor
case). It was later replaced with the SPARCstation 20
.
The SPARCStation 10 (SS10) contains two MBus slots running at either 36 MHz (33 MHz for the earliest models) or 40 MHz (set via motherboard jumper). Each MBus slot can contain single or dual SPARC
CPU modules, permitting expansion to up to four CPUs. Both SuperSPARC and hyperSPARC
CPU modules were available. Single SuperSPARC modules without external cache were sold by Sun; they ran at the clock speed of the MBus (uniprocessor Models 20, 30 and 40; dual processor Model 402). Single and a few dual SuperSPARC modules with 1 MB external cache were also sold; they were independently clocked, and ran at a higher rate than the MBus, most commonly 40.3 MHz or 50 MHz (uniprocessor Models 41 and 51; multiprocessor Models 412, 512 and 514). Sun's dual 50 MHz SuperSPARC modules (the only dual MBus modules supported by Sun for this system) were double-width, physically occupying one SBus
slot per module in addition to an MBus slot. SuperSPARC modules with and without external cache could not be mixed. SuperSPARC modules with external cache could be mixed, even with different clock speeds, but this was not a Sun-supported configuration.
Ross
hyperSPARC modules were also available from third party vendors.http://sunstuff.org/hardware/systems/sun4/ The SS10 had reasonable cooling capacity given the cramped "pizzabox" case, but it was not designed for some of the higher-speed hyperSPARC modules, and so heat issues were common when these modules were used, particularly in four CPU configurations http://mbus.sunhelp.org/systems/sun/ss10.htm.
hard drives and a floppy disk
drive. Other SCSI devices can be attached via the external SCSI port. There is no ATA
disk support.
interface, which can be accessed from a built-in 10BASE-T
jack or via a special 26-pin port that provides both AUI
and audio connections; only one of these network ports can be active at a time. A special cable or adapter is needed to convert the latter port to a standard DA-15 connector.
There are also two Basic Rate Interface
(BRI) ISDN connectors; the system shipped with plastic blocking plugs inserted in these connectors.
Additional SBus network cards can also be added.
used on the SPARCstation 20
, requiring a 4MB or 8MB VSIMM to operate. Interestingly, all SPARCstation 10s seem to have the VSIMM slots, a cutout in the case and solder pads for the SX's 13W3 connector. Other options include the CG6 (GX, GX+, Turbo GX and TGX+) 8-bit SBus framebuffers, capable of up to 1280×1024 resolution in 8-bit color, and the ZX (Leo). The ZX is a 24-bit card with hardware-accelerated 3D operations, offering high speeds and resolutions, however, it's poorly supported, takes up two SBus slots, and runs extremely hot. Its faster cousin, the Turbo ZX, requires a fan card, taking up all four SBus slots. Full support is only available in Solaris 2.4 through 2.6, though the 2.6 drivers can be made to work in Solaris 7, 8 and 9. Linux includes an accelerated driver for it which supports 2D acceleration features, but no 3D. NetBSD
and OpenBSD
support it, but without acceleration, while NeXTSTEP
and OPENSTEP have no support whatsoever.
and serial number in NVRAM
. If the battery on this chip dies, then the system will not be able to boot.
Workstation
A workstation is a high-end microcomputer designed for technical or scientific applications. Intended primarily to be used by one person at a time, they are commonly connected to a local area network and run multi-user operating systems...
computer
Computer
A computer is a programmable machine designed to sequentially and automatically carry out a sequence of arithmetic or logical operations. The particular sequence of operations can be changed readily, allowing the computer to solve more than one kind of problem...
made by Sun Microsystems
Sun Microsystems
Sun Microsystems, Inc. was a company that sold :computers, computer components, :computer software, and :information technology services. Sun was founded on February 24, 1982...
. Announced in May 1992, it was Sun's first desktop multiprocessor (being housed in a pizza box form factor
Pizza box form factor
In computing, a pizza box is a style of case for computers or network switches. Cases of this type tend to be wide and flat, normally one or two rack units in height, thus resembling pizza delivery boxes....
case). It was later replaced with the SPARCstation 20
SPARCstation 20
The SPARCstation 20 is a Sun Microsystems workstation based on the SuperSPARC or hyperSPARC CPU. It was the last model in the SPARCstation family of Sun "pizza box" computers, which was superseded by the UltraSPARC design in 1995.-CPU support:The SPARCstation 20 had dual 50 MHz MBus ports that...
.
CPU support
SPARC
SPARC is a RISC instruction set architecture developed by Sun Microsystems and introduced in mid-1987....
CPU modules, permitting expansion to up to four CPUs. Both SuperSPARC and hyperSPARC
HyperSPARC
The hyperSPARC, code-named "Pinnacle", is a microprocessor that implements the SPARC Version 8 instruction set architecture developed by Ross Technology for Cypress Semiconductor....
CPU modules were available. Single SuperSPARC modules without external cache were sold by Sun; they ran at the clock speed of the MBus (uniprocessor Models 20, 30 and 40; dual processor Model 402). Single and a few dual SuperSPARC modules with 1 MB external cache were also sold; they were independently clocked, and ran at a higher rate than the MBus, most commonly 40.3 MHz or 50 MHz (uniprocessor Models 41 and 51; multiprocessor Models 412, 512 and 514). Sun's dual 50 MHz SuperSPARC modules (the only dual MBus modules supported by Sun for this system) were double-width, physically occupying one SBus
SBus
SBus is a computer bus system that was used in most SPARC-based computers from Sun Microsystems and others during the 1990s...
slot per module in addition to an MBus slot. SuperSPARC modules with and without external cache could not be mixed. SuperSPARC modules with external cache could be mixed, even with different clock speeds, but this was not a Sun-supported configuration.
Ross
Ross Technology, Inc.
Ross Technology, Inc. was a semiconductor design and manufacturing company, specializing in SPARC microprocessors. It was founded in Austin, Texas in August 1988 by Dr. Roger D. Ross, a leading computer scientist who headed Motorola's Advanced Microprocessor Division and directed the developments...
hyperSPARC modules were also available from third party vendors.http://sunstuff.org/hardware/systems/sun4/ The SS10 had reasonable cooling capacity given the cramped "pizzabox" case, but it was not designed for some of the higher-speed hyperSPARC modules, and so heat issues were common when these modules were used, particularly in four CPU configurations http://mbus.sunhelp.org/systems/sun/ss10.htm.
Disk drives
The SS10's enclosure can hold two SCSISCSI
Small Computer System Interface is a set of standards for physically connecting and transferring data between computers and peripheral devices. The SCSI standards define commands, protocols, and electrical and optical interfaces. SCSI is most commonly used for hard disks and tape drives, but it...
hard drives and a floppy disk
Floppy disk
A floppy disk is a disk storage medium composed of a disk of thin and flexible magnetic storage medium, sealed in a rectangular plastic carrier lined with fabric that removes dust particles...
drive. Other SCSI devices can be attached via the external SCSI port. There is no ATA
AT Attachment
Parallel ATA , originally ATA, is an interface standard for the connection of storage devices such as hard disks, solid-state drives, floppy drives, and optical disc drives in computers. The standard is maintained by X3/INCITS committee...
disk support.
Network support
There is one onboard EthernetEthernet
Ethernet is a family of computer networking technologies for local area networks commercially introduced in 1980. Standardized in IEEE 802.3, Ethernet has largely replaced competing wired LAN technologies....
interface, which can be accessed from a built-in 10BASE-T
10BASE-T
Ethernet over twisted pair technologies use twisted-pair cables for the physical layer of an Ethernet computer network. Other Ethernet cable standards employ coaxial cable or optical fiber. Early versions developed in the 1980s included StarLAN followed by 10BASE-T. By the 1990s, fast, inexpensive...
jack or via a special 26-pin port that provides both AUI
Attachment Unit Interface
An Attachment Unit Interface is a 15 pin connection that provides a path between a node's Ethernet interface and the Medium Attachment Unit , sometimes known as a transceiver. It is the part of the IEEE Ethernet standard located between the Media Access Control , and the MAU...
and audio connections; only one of these network ports can be active at a time. A special cable or adapter is needed to convert the latter port to a standard DA-15 connector.
There are also two Basic Rate Interface
Basic rate interface
Basic Rate Interface is an Integrated Services Digital Network configuration intended primarily for use in subscriber lines similar to those that have long been used for plain old telephone service...
(BRI) ISDN connectors; the system shipped with plastic blocking plugs inserted in these connectors.
Additional SBus network cards can also be added.
Graphics support
Most SPARCstation 10 systems lack integrated graphics. A very few, referred to as the SPARCstation 10SX, include the SX, or CG14, framebufferFramebuffer
A framebuffer is a video output device that drives a video display from a memory buffer containing a complete frame of data.The information in the memory buffer typically consists of color values for every pixel on the screen...
used on the SPARCstation 20
SPARCstation 20
The SPARCstation 20 is a Sun Microsystems workstation based on the SuperSPARC or hyperSPARC CPU. It was the last model in the SPARCstation family of Sun "pizza box" computers, which was superseded by the UltraSPARC design in 1995.-CPU support:The SPARCstation 20 had dual 50 MHz MBus ports that...
, requiring a 4MB or 8MB VSIMM to operate. Interestingly, all SPARCstation 10s seem to have the VSIMM slots, a cutout in the case and solder pads for the SX's 13W3 connector. Other options include the CG6 (GX, GX+, Turbo GX and TGX+) 8-bit SBus framebuffers, capable of up to 1280×1024 resolution in 8-bit color, and the ZX (Leo). The ZX is a 24-bit card with hardware-accelerated 3D operations, offering high speeds and resolutions, however, it's poorly supported, takes up two SBus slots, and runs extremely hot. Its faster cousin, the Turbo ZX, requires a fan card, taking up all four SBus slots. Full support is only available in Solaris 2.4 through 2.6, though the 2.6 drivers can be made to work in Solaris 7, 8 and 9. Linux includes an accelerated driver for it which supports 2D acceleration features, but no 3D. NetBSD
NetBSD
NetBSD is a freely available open source version of the Berkeley Software Distribution Unix operating system. It was the second open source BSD descendant to be formally released, after 386BSD, and continues to be actively developed. The NetBSD project is primarily focused on high quality design,...
and OpenBSD
OpenBSD
OpenBSD is a Unix-like computer operating system descended from Berkeley Software Distribution , a Unix derivative developed at the University of California, Berkeley. It was forked from NetBSD by project leader Theo de Raadt in late 1995...
support it, but without acceleration, while NeXTSTEP
NEXTSTEP
NeXTSTEP was the object-oriented, multitasking operating system developed by NeXT Computer to run on its range of proprietary workstation computers, such as the NeXTcube...
and OPENSTEP have no support whatsoever.
NVRAM
The SS10 holds system information such as MAC addressMAC address
A Media Access Control address is a unique identifier assigned to network interfaces for communications on the physical network segment. MAC addresses are used for numerous network technologies and most IEEE 802 network technologies, including Ethernet...
and serial number in NVRAM
NVRAM
Non-volatile random-access memory is random-access memory that retains its information when power is turned off, which is described technically as being non-volatile...
. If the battery on this chip dies, then the system will not be able to boot.
Operating systems
- SunOSSunOSSunOS is a version of the Unix operating system developed by Sun Microsystems for their workstation and server computer systems. The SunOS name is usually only used to refer to versions 1.0 to 4.1.4 of SunOS...
4.1.3 onwards - Solaris (Solaris 2.1 to 9; Solaris 10 dropped support for 32-bit32-bitThe range of integer values that can be stored in 32 bits is 0 through 4,294,967,295. Hence, a processor with 32-bit memory addresses can directly access 4 GB of byte-addressable memory....
SPARC systems.) - LinuxLinuxLinux is a Unix-like computer operating system assembled under the model of free and open source software development and distribution. The defining component of any Linux system is the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released October 5, 1991 by Linus Torvalds...
- NetBSDNetBSDNetBSD is a freely available open source version of the Berkeley Software Distribution Unix operating system. It was the second open source BSD descendant to be formally released, after 386BSD, and continues to be actively developed. The NetBSD project is primarily focused on high quality design,...
/SPARC - OpenBSDOpenBSDOpenBSD is a Unix-like computer operating system descended from Berkeley Software Distribution , a Unix derivative developed at the University of California, Berkeley. It was forked from NetBSD by project leader Theo de Raadt in late 1995...
/SPARC - NeXTSTEPNEXTSTEPNeXTSTEP was the object-oriented, multitasking operating system developed by NeXT Computer to run on its range of proprietary workstation computers, such as the NeXTcube...
- OPENSTEP/Mach
External links
- SPARCstation 10 Handbook
- The Rough Guide to MBus Modules - SPARCStation 10
- http://sunstuff.org/hardware/systems/sun4/
- http://www.obsolyte.com/sun_ss10/
- [ftp://sparkle.rodents.montreal.qc.ca/mouse/docs/Sun/ZX/index.html Detailed documentation on ZX framebuffer]