Hewlett Packard Ships Industry's Fastest 3-D Accelerators for its Graphics Workstations; Freedom Series from HP Provides Graphics Visualization Performance Leadership; Extends HP's Workstation Solutions for Technical Market Customers.

PALO ALTO, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Jan. 17, 1995--Expanding its high-end graphics workstation product line, Hewlett-Packard Company today announced worldwide commercial shipment of the Freedom Series of high-performance graphics accelerators for its HP 9000 Series 700 workstations.

The Freedom Series graphics accelerators from HP are based on technology supplied by Evans & Sutherland (E&S) Computer Corp. and enable HP to deliver the industry's fastest OpenGL graphics performance.

The Freedom Series graphics accelerators from HP deliver industry-leading 3-D graphics performance of up to 4 million 3-D vectors per second, 800,000 polygons per second and 2 million trimesh 3-D polygons per second. Targeted at automotive and industrial designers and engineers, the Freedom Series graphics accelerators from HP now are available on the Models 715/80 and 715/100 workstations, and also will be available on future high-performance HP workstations. These accelerators are based on E&S' Velocity technology and support the OpenGL graphics application programming interfaces (APIs). Support for PEXlib, PHIGS and Starbase APIs is scheduled for delivery in 1995.

"By bringing the Freedom Series to our workstation customers, HP has raised the bar in advanced 3-D visualization price-performance for graphics-intensive applications," said Mark A. Canepa, general manager of HP's Workstation Systems Division. "The Freedom Series from HP rounds out our already impressive family of desktop and deskside graphics workstations, and the new combination of HP's workstations and Freedom Series graphics accelerators provides the industry's fastest OpenGL 3-D graphics performance for our technical-market customers."

TARGET APPLICATION AREAS

The Freedom Series accelerators from HP are ideally suited for workstation users in graphics-intensive applications, including advanced analysis, visualization, oil-and-gas exploration and high-end industrial design/styling, which require advanced hardware acceleration for texture-mapping, anti-aliased lines, points and polygons, and transparency. Markets requiring these features include mechanical computer-aided design (MCAD); architecture, engineering and construction; oil and gas; scientific visualization, visual simulation, medical imaging; and other applications with high-performance-hardware requirements.

HP is working with independent software vendors in key application areas such as MCAD, oil and gas, and visualization to optimize their applications for HP's graphics workstations.

"HP's workstation is an excellent host platform for our Freedom Series graphics accelerator," said Jim Oyler, president and chief executive officer of Evans & Sutherland. "This combination is an outstanding tool for graphics applications and markets that demand the best technology available in the industry."

"There is a growing demand from our customers for our 3-D design and styling tools on HP workstations with our CDRS(1) and 3-D Paint applications on the Freedom Series from HP," said Thomas Jensen, vice president of the Design Software Division of Evans & Sutherland.

OPENGL GRAPHICS-PERFORMANCE LEADERSHIP

The Freedom Series from HP combines industry-leading OpenGL graphics performance with aggressive price points. For example, the HP Model 715/100, featuring the Freedom Series 3150 system with 64MB RAM, a 2GB hard disk, 1MB of texture memory and a 20-inch, high-resolution color monitor, is $84,355 (U.S.). The Model 715/100 featuring the Freedom Series 3250 system with 64MB RAM, a 2GB hard disk, 4MB of texture memory and a 20-inch, high-resolution color monitor, is $124,000 (U.S.), and a similarly configured Model 715/100 with the Freedom Series 3400 system $171,700 (U.S.).

HP is the only workstation vendor to support the eight-module 3400 graphics accelerator, which provides the highest OpenGL graphics throughput in the industry. In addition, according to benchmarking information supplied by HP to the Graphics Performance Characterization (GPC) Committee's OpenGL Characterization Performance (OCP) subcommittee, the Freedom Series from HP offers the highest OpenGL graphics performance in the industry. Recent benchmarks conducted on HP's Model 715/80 and 715/100 reveal the following OCP Viewperf performance: -0-

                       HP Model 715/80     HP Model 715/100
HP 3150 Freedom Series      19.9               20.3
HP 3250 Freedom Series      32.6               33.1
HP 3400 Freedom Series      40.1               37.4

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HP FREEDOM SERIES FEATURES

The Freedom Series accelerators from HP offer sophisticated 3-D graphics features, including full X Window System support; fully compliant, full-performance OpenGL; family-compatible PEXlib, PHIGS and Starbase (support expected to be delivered in 1995); hardware-accelerated texture mapping with up to 16MB of texture memory; anti-aliased lines, points and polygons; 24-bit multibuffered frame buffer allowing for the display of 16.7 million concurrent colors; hardware alpha buffer; stencil planes; and a hardware accumulator for full-scene anti-aliasing. Additional features include high-resolution texture mapping (including trilinear MIP mapping), advanced lighting and shading algorithms, transparency, overlay and underlay planes, alpha blending, deformation animation and perspective mapping.

U.S. PRICES AND AVAILABILITY

HP Freedom Series graphics accelerators are available immediately from HP sales representatives worldwide. The Freedom Series Model 3150 is $65,000; Model 3250 is $83,000 and Model 3400 is $135,000. Base configurations for each accelerator include 1MB of texture memory, which is upgradeable to 4MB or 16MB. For increased data-display capabilities, HP also offers an optional composite video output (CVO) for $1,200.

Evans & Sutherland produces sophisticated 3-D graphics hardware and software tools used in simulation, industrial design, and entertainment, as well as graphics accelerators for workstations and personal computers. These products are marketed through a mix of direct and indirect channels. Evans & Sutherland was founded in 1968 and is based in Salt Lake City, Utah.

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 98,400 employees and had revenue of $25 billion in its 1994 fiscal year.

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Note to Editors: (1) CDRS stands for Conceptual Design and Rendering software.

CONTACTS: Hewlett-Packard Company

Heidi Sullivan, 508/436-5096

or

Copithorne & Bellows for HP

Tim Hurley, 617/252-0606