PVR%bgerug51.earn@NSS.CS.UCL.AC.UK (Patrick Van Renterghem / Transputer Lab) (12/09/88)
This is a survey of VME boards that will appear in a VME bus magazine. If anyone spots errors or omissions, let me know. Survey of VME boards: -------------------- Cambridge RISC Machines: ----------------------- Main activities of the company are industrial control and embedded control systems. They use single eurocard boards and a special expansion bus (CRX = Cambridge RISC Extension bus). They offer UNIX and OS9 support. CRM 203 H: slave VMEbus host adapter with 2 TRAM sites on a single eurocard CRM 302 H: VMEbus master interface Protheus (distributed by Inducom Systems in the Benelux) -------- Also offer Unix and OS9 support. CPU1TB: VMEbus interface, 1 T4 or T8 with 1-8 MB RAM CPUT6A: VMEbus multitransputer interface with 6 T4's or T8's with 256 kB each Topology is configurable using wrap area on the P2 bus back wiring (no software configuration possible) TPIO32: 3 T4/T8, 256 kB RAM each, 144 I/O lines, programmable with LCA gate array Parsytec (distributed by Arcobel for the Benelux) -------- BBK-V1: slave interface with DMA controller, transfer rate up to 1 MB/s BBK-V2: master VME board with T4 or T8, 1 or 2 MB RAM (250 ns cycle time), 128 kB to 1 MB ROM MVTM: VME Multitransputer module with 4 independent nodes, each with 1 MB RAM, with a software configurable topology. Four link adaptor interfaces to the VME bus for multiuser capability Niche Technology: (dead company, but products now marketed by ----------------- Transtech) NT1000 Advanced Computing Platform: Sun plug-in board (9U = triple size VME), which uses TRAM module sites for 32 T800's, with 32 kB SRAM each or 4 T800's with 10 MB DRAM each. TDS, SunServers, SUNOS interface, Parallel C and Fortran are available, as well as the PRE Parallel Runtime Environment. It is a very good transputer development environment for a SUN workstation owner. Topology is software controlled by means of C004 link crossbar switches. The NT1000 can support 4 simultaneous users at a bandwith of 500 kB each. Topologix: --------- The Topologix 1000 is a 9U VME board for Sun-3 and Sun-4 workstations. It offers 4 T800's with 1-16 MB each (200 ns cycle time). The topology is again software controlled. They offer a Parallel Common Lisp, the Linda parallel paradigm and a Trollius-like Parallel Programming Environment. Tadpole: (distributed by TME in Belgium) TP-TSC: VME bus master, with UNIX System V support (file server, TDS, occam), 1 T414 or T800, 2 MB 250 ns RAM, 2 RS232 ports, 64 kB-256 KB EPROM site and its links are connected to P2. Inmos: ----- B011: is actually the same as the Tadpole board CSA: (distributed by ISI in Belgium) Part.8: A 6U size VMEboard for Sun and Apollo workstations with a high throughput (5 - 7 MByte/sec). General Remarks: --------------- * all boards implement VME spec Rev C * all systems can be expanded by using transputer networks connected to the external transputer link channels * some boards are software configurable, with the C004 crossbar switch * T4 means T414 or T425, T8 means the T800 floating point transputer * 3U = single eurocard height (10 cm) 6U = double eurocard height (normal VME size) 9U = triple eurocard height (Sun boards) * more information is of course available from the author