<From: Doug Yowza <yowza_at_yowza.com>
<and is populated rather sparsely by chips with date codes from '80 and
<'81. The chips seem to be from Fairchild primarily (the 32 F10470's loo
<like they might be RAM). From Mr. Cole's "limited edition" markings, I
<gather that there were 400 of these boards in his Cray-1.
The Cray-1 was ECL-10k fast for it's time but low density and rams for
that technology were 1 or 4k ECL bipolar. ECL had several
characteristics, FAST, high power consumption and low density. The
copper plate worked with a cooling system to conduct the heat away as
that machine was impossible to air cool and remain that small. Why
small? Conductors propagate singnals at 1nS a foot and a cable of several
feet actually represented a significant delay to the overall sheme of
things inside.
A note: The other commonly known and slightly more recent ECL machine
was the DEC VAX9000, built using ECL-100k built on custom air cooled
hybrids. It also consumed power in great quantities and had special
cooling considerations.
<Any idea how much RAM is on the board? Can I interface the board to my
<Sinclair ZX-81 to create the world's most perverse hybrid?
Your could but the interface would be more than the two combined and it
would eat an amazing amount of power.
Allison
Received on Tue Apr 28 1998 - 06:44:11 BST