13 Sep
2020
13 Sep
'20
12:54 p.m.
I picked up a pair (1 set) of these very neat old graphics boards.
Alas I have no idea what they are or if there is hope of using them. One is
a dual
slot 9U VME board that has gobs of video ram all over it, including a board
labeled Z buffer.
The only output are (3) BNC connectors
(R,G, and B) and a 50 pin connector marked P4.
The other is a single slot 9UVME board with (8) 30 pin SIMM slots with 1mb
SIMM in them, a couple of Weitek chips, another 50 pin connector labeled
P4, jumpered with a baby backplane to the other board, and 6 led on the
front.
Anyone know what these are and where to get drivers? They appear to be Sun
3 era, and the boards are labeled ?Sun OHC? with a megatek sticker.
They do not appear to work out-of-box in my 3/260 as console devices- the
Kernel does not identify them correctly.
Thanks.
13 Sep
13 Sep
1:28 p.m.
Alas I have no idea what they are or if there is hope
of using them.
Megatek built graphics terminals and I think plotters that were used in
CAD shops. Prime used them with some of their CAD offerings. Megatek
also did boards for at least DG, -11, Modcomp systems, maybe others. In
fact, some of the terminals may be based on Nova processors. The
Megagraphic line mentions a bit-slice custom processor inside.
The Whizzard line seems to interface via RS-232, but the Megagraphic
family brochures say they had pio/dma interfaces for a variety of
minicomputers, so are probably closer to matching your board set.
You'd be looking for the relevant terminal, I'd think.
De
2:48 p.m.
This is a VME board with 3D acceleration, and RGB out.
There is no terminal for it.
Sent from NeXTMail
On Sep 13, 2020, at 13:28, Dennis Boone <drb at
msu.edu> wrote:
?
Alas I have no idea what they are or if there is hope of using them.
Megatek built graphics terminals and I think plotters that were used in
CAD shops. Prime used them with some of their CAD offerings. Megatek
also did boards for at least DG, -11, Modcomp systems, maybe others. In
fact, some of the terminals may be based on Nova processors. The
Megagraphic line mentions a bit-slice custom processor inside.
The Whizzard line seems to interface via RS-232, but the Megagraphic
family brochures say they had pio/dma interfaces for a variety of
minicomputers, so are probably closer to matching your board set.
You'd be looking for the relevant terminal, I'd think.
De 
3:44 p.m.
On 9/13/20 2:48 PM, null via cctalk wrote:
There is no terminal for it.
Megatek started out making caligraphic displays for DG systems
those evolved into the Wizzard series. I have one with a Unibus
interface.
They switched to raster in the late 70s eventually moving to
standalone 3D color raster terminals.
The VME boards were their last gasp as a company as the graphics
terminal market collapsed.
Like all of the specialized 80's VME boards, it is going to be pretty
much impossible to find software for them today.
3:46 p.m.
On 9/13/20 3:44 PM, Al Kossow via cctalk wrote:
Like all of the specialized 80's VME boards, it is
going to be pretty
much impossible to find software for them today.
You'll note on bitsavers there is almost no documentation on 3rd party VME
boards outside of Motorola. They were so specialized, expensive, and sold
in such small numbers that not even paper documentation can be found for
them.
14 Sep
14 Sep
8:45 a.m.
On Sep 13, 2020, at 3:44 PM, Al Kossow via cctalk
<cctalk at classiccmp.org> wrote:
On 9/13/20 2:48 PM, null via cctalk wrote:
More to the point Megatek (myself and some others) modified the boot
ROM?s in the Sun 3/XXX series machines to recognize and use these
specialized boards as boot consoles.
Technically they should be recognized as cg9(?) video cards if you
have the correct boot ROMs. Good luck finding those however.
David
There is no terminal for it.
Megatek started out making caligraphic displays for DG systems
those evolved into the Wizzard series. I have one with a Unibus
interface.
They switched to raster in the late 70s eventually moving to
standalone 3D color raster terminals.
The VME boards were their last gasp as a company as the graphics
terminal market collapsed.
Like all of the specialized 80's VME boards, it is going to be pretty
much impossible to find software for them today.
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