250 MHz VR4400 provides powerful processing solution for high-end workstations and multiprocessing systems.MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--June 1, 1995--NEC Electronics Inc. Thursday announced samples of the VR4400-250, the highest-speed version available within its line of MIPS (Million Instructions Per Second) The execution speed of a computer. For example, .5 MIPS is 500,000 instructions per second; 100 MIPS is a hundred million instructions per second. RISC RISC in full Reduced Instruction Set Computing Computer architecture that uses a limited number of instructions. RISC became popular in microprocessors in the 1980s. VR-Series microprocessors to date. The new 64-bit 250 MHz VR4400 is manufactured using a 0.35-micron CMOS (Complementary Metal Oxide Semiconductor) Pronounced "c-moss." The most widely used integrated circuit design. It is found in almost every electronic product from handheld devices to mainframes. process and features integer performance of 175 SPECint92 and floating point performance of 178 SPECfp92. As a result, the device provides up to 1.7 times the performance of a 100 MHz Intel Pentium processor. In addition, the VR4400-250 provides an attractive price performance alternative for designers of high-end workstations, servers and multiprocessing systems running either Windows NT or UNIX UNIX Operating system for digital computers, developed by Ken Thompson of Bell Laboratories in 1969. It was initially designed for a single user (the name was a pun on the earlier operating system Multics). . "By employing advanced manufacturing techniques, NEC (NEC Corporation, Tokyo, www.nec.com, www.necus.com) An electronics conglomerate known in the U.S. for its monitors. In Japan, it had the lion's share of the PC market until the late 1990s (see PC 98). NEC was founded in Tokyo in 1899 as Nippon Electric Company, Ltd. has once again pushed the performance edge of the MIPS architecture and provided customers with one of the most powerful processing solutions available today," said George Wang, senior product marketing manager for NEC Electronics. "At the heart of this accomplishment is the MIPS architecture, which has consistently delivered solutions that outperform those from competing microprocessor vendors. We are confident that, together with MIPS, we will continue to provide the advanced solutions required by the performance-driven segment of the marketplace." Features and Benefits Using a 0.35-micron process, NEC has increased the clock speed on the new VR4400 to 250 MHz and improved both the floating-point and integer performance. The new device delivers 175 SPECint92 (integer performance) and 178 SPECfp92 (floating-point performance). Fully compatible with earlier speed versions, the new VR4400-250 is a true 64-bit superpipelined RISC microprocessor that features 32 Kb primary cache including 16Kb instruction and 16Kb data caches. The device further supports up to 4MB of secondary cache. In addition, an on-chip memory management unit is included that contains a fully associative translation lookaside buffer A Translation Lookaside Buffer (TLB) is a CPU cache that is used by memory management hardware to improve the speed of virtual address translation. A TLB has a fixed number of slots containing page table entries, which map virtual addresses onto physical addresses. (TLB TLB - Translation Look-aside Buffer ). the VR4400-250 features a die size of 108 millimeters squared and 2.3 million transistors. At 250 MHz, power dissipation is measured at 11.5 watts typical. The device is available in 3.45V. Packaging, Pricing and Availability The VR4400-250 is packaged in standard 179-pin and 447-pin pin grid array See PGA. (hardware) Pin Grid Array - (PGA) A style of integrated circuit socket or pin-out with pins laid out on a square or rectangular grid with a separation of 0.1 inch in each direction. The pins near the centre of the array are often missing. (PGA (1) (Professional Graphics Adapter) An early IBM PC display standard for 3D processing with 640x480x256 resolution. It was not widely used. (2) (Programmable Gate Array) See gate array and FPGA. ) packages. Samples are available now for approximately $2,000 each. Mass production is slated for Q3 `95. About NEC's VR-Series NEC licenses the MIPS RISC technology from MIPS Technologies Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary Wholly Owned Subsidiary A subsidiary whose parent company owns 100% of its common stock. Notes: In other words, the parent company owns the company outright and there are no minority owners. of Silicon Graphics Inc. Using this technology, NEC manufactures the VR-Series line of high-performance microprocessors. Beginning with the introduction of the 200 MHz VR4400 in June 1994, NEC has employed a state-of-the-art 0.35-micron (drawn) process to enhance performance and keep manufacturing costs low. The VR4000, VR4100, VR4200, VR4300 and VR4400 today comprise NEC's 64-bit RISC offering. The company will also offer the VR10000 which is expected to be one of the fastest microprocessors available and is targeted for use in high-end personal computers, workstations and multiprocessor systems. About NEC Electronics Inc. NEC Electronics, with headquarters in Mountain View, Calif., manufactures and markets an extensive line of electronic products including ASICs, microprocessors, microcomputers, digital signal processors (DSPs), memories and components including flat-panel displays. The company operates a 676,000-square-foot manufacturing facility in Roseville, Calif. NEC Electronics is an affiliate of NEC Corp., a $35 billion international manufacturer of computer, communications and semiconductor products. -0- NOTE TO EDITORS: MIPS is a registered trademark of MIPS Technologies Inc. VR-Series and VR4400 are trademarks of NEC Corp. Intel and Pentium are registered trademarks of Intel Corp. Windows NT is a trademark of Microsoft Corp. UNIX is a registered trademark of UNIX System Laboratories Unix System Laboratories or USL was originally organized as part of Bell Labs in 1989. USL joined with the UNIX Software Operation, also a Bell Laboratories division, in 1990. It assumed responsibility for Unix development and licensing activities. . VR4000, VR4100, VR4200, VR4300 and VR10000 are trademarks of NEC Corp. CONTACT: Allison Niday, 415/965-6124 (editor contact) aniday@mcimail.com or Technical Support, 800/366-9782 (reader contact) |
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