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News & Events : Press
Releases : V194
General Micro Systems Announces First Single-Board PowerPC
Workstation for Linux and VxWorks Delivers Performance of Pentium
IV Workstation at One Fourth The Power
March 31, 2003
Rancho Cucamonga, CA.
General Micro Systems today announced the V194 Streamer, the industry’s
first PowerPC CPU board to provide the functionality of a Linux
or VxWorks workstation on a single VMEbus board. Featuring two high-resolution
video channels, standard keyboard, mouse, and USB functionality,
and a spate of multi-channel I/O, LAN, mass storage, and expansion
capabilities, the V194 delivers the performance of a Pentium IV
workstation at one fourth the power (15W vs. 70W).
The V194 is configured with a 500MHz PowerPC 7410 processor with
AltiVec vector processing extensions. Featuring 32 kbytes of no-wait-state
L1 cache and two Mbytes of 166-MHz L2 cache, the V194 provides up
to two Gbytes of 133-MHz SDRAM main memory and 64 Mbytes of application
flash. The V194 also features two high-resolution video interfaces,
three Fast Ethernet ports, onboard Ultra SCSI, two USB interfaces,
four high-speed serial ports, two PMC interfaces, (with custom options
for three additional) and two Ultra DMA IDE interfaces. This combination
of high performance, versatile multi-channel I/O, and integrated
workstation functionality makes the V194 ideal for a wide range
of high-speed telecom, defense, industrial imaging and automation
systems.
“Streamer’s integrated video and workstation functionality
puts PowerPC-based Linux and VxWorks workstations on a par with
Pentium IV systems, while consuming one fourth the power,”
said Ben Sharfi, president of General Micro Systems. “Now,
PowerPC OEMs can run their applications and server on the same board.”
The V194 provides unprecedented I/O throughput, utilizing a Galileo
GT-64260 North Bridge with 18 independent DMA channels to move data
between the PowerPC processor, memory, I/O devices, VMEbus and mass
storage subsystems without CPU intervention. Featuring a 133-MHz
Front Side Bus, Galileo utilizes dual 64-bit PCI local buses to
transfer data at up to 533 Mbyte/sec, thereby alleviating traditional
PCI bottlenecks and enabling the V194 to accommodate multiple high-speed
I/O devices and expansion interfaces. To further enhance I/O performance,
Galileo provides three integrated Ethernet ports and two 10-Mbit/sec
synchronous serial channels, which can access system memory without
having to traverse either PCI bus.
The V194 provides the richest I/O functionality of any VMEbus CPU
board. Equipped with two video ports supporting resolutions as high
as 1600 x 1200, the V194 features three 10/100BaseTx auto-negotiate
Fast Ethernet interfaces, two USB ports, and an Ultra SCSI-160/320
interface, which supports differential-mode data transfer rates
of up to 320 Mbyte/sec. The V194 also provides two Ultra DMA-66/100
IDE interfaces, one of which can be used to mount an on-board 2.5-inch,
20-Gbyte hard drive without occupying an additional VMEbus slot.
Other standard I/O features include mouse/keyboard, 14 discrete
digital I/O lines, a printer port, and four serial I/O channels,
two of which are fully synchronous and able to perform serial transfers
at speeds of up to 10Mbits/s using HDLC and BISYNC protocols.
To support custom I/O expansion, and provide access to ultra high-performance
graphics, mass storage, and WAN interface options, the V194 also
has two 64-bit, 66-MHz PMC slots. Two of the slots are provided
on the baseboard. An additional, optional three PMC slots could
be added through a customer expansion card, which would require
a second VMEbus slot. These interfaces connect directly to the V194’s
high-speed PCI local buses, making them ideal for high-speed networking
applications like Gigabit Ethernet and Fibre channel. The PMC interfaces
also provide rear panel access, greatly enhancing I/O flexibility.
The V194 can be used with standard VME64 backplanes, implements
the full VITA VMEbus extensions, supports 16-, 32-, and 64-bit VMEbus
transfers, and can act as a master or slave with full Slot One system
control functionality.
To ensure safe and reliable operation, the V194 provides a System
Health Monitor, which reports processor temperature, onboard voltages,
and fan speed to the operating system. The V194 also provides 100%
Power-On-Self-Test (POST) diagnostics, which use two binary LED
displays on the front panel to indicate the status of more than
50 tests each time power is applied to the board.
Software support for the V194 includes VxWorks -Tornado II, Linux
and QNX.
The V194 Streamer comes with a 500MHz PowerPC 7410 processor, two
Mbytes of L2 cache, and 64 Mbytes of user flash as the standard
configuration. For more information on the V194 including price
and availability, please contact General Micro Systems, Inc. at
8358 Maple Place, Rancho Cucamonga, CA 91730. Phone: 1-800-307-4863
or (909) 980-4863. Fax: (909) 987-4863. E-mail: sales@gms4sbc.com.
World Wide Web site: www.gms4sbc.com
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