Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!uwm.edu!rpi!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!usc!cs.utexas.edu!helios!daugher
From: daugher@cs.tamu.edu (Dr. Walter C. Daugherity)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next
Subject: Re: Next rumours from MacWeek
Message-ID: <6550@helios.TAMU.EDU>
Date: 13 Jul 90 15:53:06 GMT
References: <1990Jun28.184153.27766@midway.uchicago.edu> <680033@hpcuhc.HP.COM> <441@adiron.UUCP>
Sender: usenet@helios.TAMU.EDU
Organization: Texas A&M University
Lines: 27

In article <441@adiron.UUCP> richf@adiron.UUCP (Rick Fanta) writes:
>Speaking of the next Next, here's a thought that I've had.  Please shoot it down for me.
>I've heard rumors on this newsgroup that the new Moto DSP chip (MC96001?) was not avail-
>able in time to be incorporated into the new machine.  To do rendering in real-time, though,
>the muscle of this chip or a "RISC on steroids" like the i860 seems necessary (or so I'm 
>told by people that actually know something ;-).
>Why not offer the new chip on an add-in card (separate card or special card that clips
>into the motherboard)?  Better yet, why not use the parallel processing capabilities of
>the chip (and Mach) and allow multiple (floating point) DSPs to be used in parallel???
>What are the problems with this???
>All comments appreciated.
>Rick Fanta	PAR Technologies, New Hartford, NY

The 96xxx DSP is indeed impressive, but it is also expensive for now.  I don't
know about availability.  However, you are quite correct about the need for
extraordinary muscle to do the promised extraordinary graphics, so you can
expect a substantial CPU and multiple (parallel) FPU's on the color graphics 
board.  Whether the graphics CPU will be running under Mach remains to be
seen. It will have to be on another board--there's no room on the main board 
and in my opinion daughter boards would have clearance and cooling problems.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Walter C. Daugherity			Internet, NeXTmail: daugher@cs.tamu.edu
Knowledge Systems Research Center	uucp: uunet!cs.tamu.edu!daugher
Texas A & M University			BITNET: DAUGHER@TAMVENUS
College Station, TX 77843-3112		CSNET: daugher%cs.tamu.edu@RELAY.CS.NET
	---Not an official document of Texas A&M---