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From: roy@phri.UUCP
Newsgroups: comp.sys.dec
Subject: Iverson 11/750 accelerator
Message-ID: <2637@phri.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 7-Apr-87 15:13:26 EST
Article-I.D.: phri.2637
Posted: Tue Apr  7 15:13:26 1987
Date-Received: Sat, 11-Apr-87 03:48:53 EST
Reply-To: roy@phri.UUCP (Roy Smith)
Organization: Public Health Research Inst. (NY, NY)
Lines: 24


	The latest issue of Hardcopy (A DEC-oriented trade rag) has an
interesting item.  A company called Iverson, Inc in Fremont, CA is selling
a card that plugs into the back of a VAX-11/750 backplane and supposedly
speeds up the machine by 15-25%.  They say "System speed is improved by a
new clock that pulses variably, according to the exact time required for
each instruction, rather than a fixed pulse that is standard on the VAX
750s".  The card is supposed to be completely transparant.

	Has anybody used one of these?  Do they actually work?  I don't
have a price, but if it's just a few $k, it might be worth it if it really
does get 25% (or even 15%) more performance out of the machine.  On the
other hand, the idea of plugging in some random board that purports to play
with (I'm guessing now) the microsequencer clock sounds kind of scary.

	Next question: why would somebody invest good engineering time to
make a product which is specific to an 11/750, a machine which isn't made
any more and will probably be obsolete in a couple more years?
-- 
Roy Smith, {allegra,cmcl2,philabs}!phri!roy
System Administrator, Public Health Research Institute
455 First Avenue, New York, NY 10016

"you can't spell deoxyribonucleic without unix!"