On Thu, 02 Jan 1997 00:42:51 -0800  Jason Thorpe wrote:

>  > Anyone working on port for hp3000 series of machines (hppa?) ?
> 
> Hmm... hp3000... weren't they the MPE systems?  I wasn't aware they
> were PA-RISC systems...

Old MPE systems weren't PA-RISC, but newer (last 8 years or so) ones
running MPE/XL are.  Not that this necessarily helps; they correspond
to 800 series HP-UX machines and not the 700 series workstations that
the Mach work was done for.

A free Unix port to 800/900s seems to me unlikely since HP change the
bus architecture so often -- I've seen four or different types of
expansion card since 1989, but hey, I'm not a kernel hacker.  Kernel
hackers *like* challenges, right? :-)

For anyone who isn't bored yet, here is what I *think* I remember
knowing about HP hardware.  People with better memories than mine can
be found on comp.sys.hp.hardware.

300:	68000 based workstations (most can run NetBSD)

400:	same as above (marketing changed the name to commemorate the
        merger(?) with Apollo)

500 (a)	First incarnation: non-PA-RISC, non-68000 multiuser HP-UX system.
        I saw one once ... never used one.

    (b) Second incarnation: some multiuser NT PC thingy I've never
	seen either. (Clever of marketing to reuse the name, what?)
	
700:	PA-RISC 1.1 and upwards workstations

	These are the ones the Mach work was done for, I think.  There
	appear to have been changes in the memory architecture for the
	712, and I'm not personaly familiar with newer ones.

	C and D series are "700s".  (Love marketing.)

800:	PA-RISC 1.0 and upwards multiuser systems.

	Problem here for any *BSD, Mach or Linux port: the bus
	architecture keeps changing and is frequently multi level.
	(Personally, I'd find the three phase power requirement on
	early ones a nuisance too!)

	E, F, G, H, I, K and T series are 800s.  (Really love
	marketing.)

900:	Same hardware (mostly? all?) as 800, but runs MPE/XL.

	You can actually boot HP-UX on a 900, and I presume the other
	way around.  There were some hardware differences but probably
	just options that were only supported on one OS or the other.

Just to add to the confusion, "9000" is not a hardware designation but
can be used to refer to anything running HP-UX.  Yes, even a lowly 320
running HP-UX 5.x is a 9000 ... (*absolutely* *love* *marketing*).

Giles