Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!ames!rex!ginosko!uunet!mcvax!nikhefh!l86
From: l86@nikhefh.hep.nl (Hugo Burm)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.transputer
Subject: Re: ATW
Message-ID: <225@nikhefh.hep.nl>
Date: 27 Jul 89 11:36:22 GMT
References: <234@brazos.Rice.edu>
Reply-To: l86@nikhefh.hep.nl (Hugo Burm)
Organization: Nikhef-H, Amsterdam (the Netherlands).
Lines: 32

In article <234@brazos.Rice.edu> rhode@ricevm1.rice.edu writes:
>Does anyone know anything about the Atari Tansputer Workstation?
>Does it really exist?  I'd like to know more about it.
>
>
>Robert Rhode		|	"Today's champion
>bgr@uncle-bens.rice.edu	|    is tomorrow's crocodile shit."
>rhode@ricevm1.rice.edu	| Monty Python : Contractual Obligation Album

Yes it exists. An Atari dealer in Amsterdam has one in its shop (you 
can buy it).

It runs a Unix-like OS called Helios that distributes tasks over the 
transputers, e.g.: if you type "ls | wc" , one transputer lists the 
directory to a neigbouring transputer (if available) which does the 
counting.

The user interface is a csh clone running in a window under X-windows. 
The X-windows interface is very fast. The ATW's graphic capabilities 
are impressive (from 1280x960 in 16 colors down to 512x480 in (24+8) 
bits true color).

I did some programming in C and F77 on an ATW containing two add-on 
farmcards, that is a total of nine transputers (90 MIPS, 13.5 Mflops).
The compilers and linker are not very fast (mainly due to the slow disk 
access via the 68000 I/O subsystem), but the resulting programs are 
fast. You can compile three files on three transputers, write the 
results to a fifo buffer and link them on a fourth transputer, all 'in 
parallel'.

The price of a one T800 ATW is about $7500. This may change since I am 
talking about pre-production models for software developers.