HP/DEC/Compaq

These are actually kind of cool boxes. You need to find the deskside front panel and lose the rackmount version. The one I have has one. There are also graphics cards for them. Mine has a 2d version although I've never actually hooked it up to a monitor. Has a EVC connector and I don't have an adapter.

Hey, that looks just like my D370! Quite how the qualified for the name UltraLight, I'm baffled.

It is amazing how heavy it is actually. Way heavier then it looks. Mines a 280/2. Dual 180mhz pa-8000. I really need to find a EVC adapter and give its graphics a try.

Dang. You have my terminal Leaknoil. >_>
So graphics cards do actually exist? I was looking at the EISA but for a while and wondering how rare EISA video cards would be unless the graphics options were actually ISA.

You got me curious so, I opened it up and looked inside. It appears to be something called a HP A4450A Visualize-EG card and it uses the HSC connection. There isn't much on the board actually. Especially for when it was made. I would bet its pretty limited in capability.

Here's a picture of one. Mine is identical. Missing IC's and all.

The bus it uses is called GSC - general system connect. Electrically it's the same as the HSC found in the server system types.

The EG stands for "Entry Graphics", so yes, it's quite limited. 1280x1024 @ 8bpp, unaccelerated. No double buffering, no overlay planes unless you have an extended memory model. The memory upgrade plugs into the white expansion connector, and makes it somewhat equivalent in function to the Visualize-8. There is also a two-head model with two EVC connectors, which makes use of the unused board area to provide a second full graphics adapter. This is what the empty solder pads are for.

I see now. Hmm, I wonder what it would take to find a suitable card? I guess that's a task for another day.

D-Series are servers. You can tell by the giant 6 foot tall rack his came in

Mine has "Turbo HSC" silkscreened at that connector. Not that I imagine it makes any difference at all.

Perhaps it is just saying it needs a fan to work.

those cards are pretty easy to find on ebay (or were)

I saw a couple when I was trying to figure out what it was. They wanted $50 or so. That is about ten times more then I'd probably pay for one. You also have to find a EVC to svga adapter and the HP ones seem to be fetching $40 as well.

Damn, exactly what I was afraid of. Unless I either get lucky or pay about $100 I'm going to have on my hands a nice rack full of hardware and the only way I can communicate with it is over terminals. Actually, that does not sound half bad.

Don't worry about the graphics cards. HP liked to crow about their Visualize graphics (they liked to say that Visualize/FX was "better than anything SGI has on the desktop"), but really there isn't much out there that uses it. Stock HP X11 works just fine in an 8-bit setup, and unless you have some of the CADAM software that really sold the fancy Visualize workstations (look up the HP Corvette Box to see about it) there won't be anything that actually uses the graphics except, possibly, some freeware software (Blender doesn't even have a HP-UX binary). I had Visualize/FX in a B1000L (faster than anything you can get in the GSC/HSC connected cards) and I wound up pulling it to save on the power and heat output. Run it to a remote X server - you won't miss much. HP didn't ship much of the stuff that SGI did to help you use their graphics - just OpenGL libraries.

What you might miss is the special 25(?)th line where HP does their F-key mapping and suchlike. It's supported on real HP terminals and the glass console, but doesn't work right with Wyse/DEC/other types of terminal. Good news, though - you can get a free Windows HP terminal emulator here http://www.aics-research.com/qcterm/index.html .

That's nifty. Thanks for the tip.

BTW you probably need a HSC form-factor card rather than the horizontal form factor card. Check the HP products guide.

Awesome! Thanks SAQ. I have been looking for a decent HP terminal emulator.
Okay, so I guess unless Ia actually do find a framebuffer I'll just live with terminals for now which I guess is the better idea anyways as I don't see myself putting this thing in any places where I could easily setup a desk next to it. (closets can be pretty small )

EDIT: Awesome! I have located yet another HP terminal!

Man, this brings back memories of my old 735 with a screaming graphics card. That Parrot pic in my Avatar was at 24 bit depth, and the PEX 3D demo made the DirectX spinning cube look lame.

I'd use the old 8-bit card for now, but if you get the chance, get the higher end card. I still couldn't believe what my old 735 could do, and it was a bit older and less powerful than the Leviathan you lucked up on.

I hope one day to find another HP-UX machine. Unfortunately I sold mine after it broke down, but I hear its new owner is making progress on it and the old HP 318 I had.

A grapics card would be nice but I don't see many good ones that are affordable....
I'm still struggling to find a rack to put this back into. It's just so large. I have never worked with anything so enormous. Also, it seems it was not a good idea for me to leave the PDU in the last rack. Without it I can't really use the UPS system (which with a bit of work I got plugged into my dryer outlet and watched power up and charge the batteries enough to suffice it is worth keeping).