HP's Latest PA-RISC Microprocessor Evolution Enables 50 Percent Application Performance Boost -- Highest Spec95 Performance of all Available Chips

New PA-8200 Design Expands System Bandwidth and Dramatically Improves Performance of Commercial, Technical and Internet Applications

PALO ALTO, Calif., Oct. 23, 1996 -- Hewlett-Packard Company today announced a powerful new member of its PA-8000 family of 64-bit PA-RISC(1) microprocessors, the PA-8200. HP said PA-8200 microprocessor samples are available immediately to its partners. Details of the PA-8200 were presented at the 1996 Microprocessor Forum in San Jose.

The new 220MHz processor, which is scheduled for shipment in HP systems beginning in the first half of 1997, is expected to boost commercial and technical application performance by an average of 50 percent. Such applications include Internet, transaction processing, database access and management, accounting, computer-aided design and manufacturing (CAD/CAM) and communications.

The microprocessor is expected to achieve an estimated 15.5 SPECint95 integer and 25 SPECfp95 floating-point processing performance. The PA-8200 outperforms HP's PA-8000, the industry's most powerful microprocessor shipping in volume, with a 25 percent increase in integer performance and a 10 percent increase in floating-point processing performance.

The PA-8200's implementation in HP's broad range of computing products is indicative of HP's continued focus on system engineering, taking full advantage of the microprocessor's capabilities. Using comprehensive design methodology, HP delivers superior application performance at higher levels than the microprocessor's raw performance would indicate.

"This is an impressive evolutionary jump in HP PA-RISC and system technology that will allow us to provide our customers with the most powerful means to drive their applications," said Richard W. (Rich) Sevcik, HP vice president and general manager of the Systems Technology Group. "Customers will be impressed by the performance in new systems built upon the PA-8200 when they are rolled out in 1997."

Like the PA-8000, the PA-8200 is a scaleable 64-bit microprocessor with multiprocessing capabilities, branch prediction and four-way out-of-order execution features, all of which contribute to faster application performance. The new chip is built using a five-metal-layer, 0.5-micron 3.3V process; it has 3.8 million transistors.

The new features of the PA-8200 include larger cache, improved memory management and improved dynamic branch prediction. The new features allow the PA-8200 to improve application performance an average 50 percent for commercial transaction-processing applications and technical applications such as mechanical-design automation, electronic-design automation, geographical information systems and technical software development.

When implemented in specifically targeted workstations and servers, these microprocessors will enable Internet and multimedia access faster than ever before. Computers using the PA-8200 also will provide users with increased performance for computation, graphics, business, communications and electronic-commerce applications.

The PA-8200 is the product of a well-balanced evolution that includes improvements to on-chip signal paths and dynamic branch prediction. HP improved the accuracy of dynamic branch prediction with the PA-8200 by increasing the number of branch-prediction cache entries from 256 to 1,024. Other improvements include increasing primary cache size to 2MB by using next-generation SRAMS and re-engineering the main memory subsystem, decreasing peak latencies on the system bus by 45 percent. In addition, the PA-8200 reduces read/write collision rates with additional buffering capability and by allowing out-of-order bank accesses to main memory. All these improvements help increase overall system-level application performance for PA-8200-based systems.

PA-RISC Background

From its inception in 1986, PA-RISC technology was designed to extend well into the next century. HP designed PA-RISC in a simplified, modular fashion to accommodate future technologies, decrease system-design costs and reduce time-to-market for new products. HP offers the industry's broadest line of RISC-based workstations and business systems and servers.

Demand for RISC-based computers has grown steadily since the first commercially available RISC systems were shipped in the mid-1980s. According to the January 1996 issue of the newsletter, "Inside the New Computer Industry," total RISC-system revenue for 1995 was $41.73 billion (U.S.), with PA-RISC achieving the leadership position with 30 percent market share. HP leads the industry in total RISC-system revenue for the seventh consecutive year.

Currently, PA-RISC technology spans HP systems, ranging from $7,000 (U.S.) workstations to large-scale, 14-way symmetric multiprocessing systems with mainframe-class performance to enterprise parallel servers, scaleable to 224 processors. This demonstrates PA-RISC's inherent scaleability, a primary objective of its original architecture definition, and protects customer's hardware and software investments in this architecture.

Hewlett-Packard Company is a leading global manufacturer of computing, communications and measurement products and services recognized for excellence in quality and support. HP has 110,800 employees and had revenue of $31.5 billion in its 1995 fiscal year.

Information about HP and its products can be found on the World Wide Web at http://www.hp.com.

(1) PA-RISC stands for Precision Architecture-reduced-instruction-set computing.