Unisys Corp has left it to Camarillo, California-based Vitesse Semiconductor Corp to reveal to the world that Gallium Arsenide microprocessors have made it into the mainframe mainstream. Vitesse reveals that the latest implementation of the Unisys SCAMP Single Chip A Series Mainframe Processor – used in new models of the A11, is implemented as a single-chip Vitesse FX200K gate array – and is claimed to offer better than double the performance of similar BiCMOS or sub-micron CMOS designs. The H-GaAs SCAMP, the fourth generation of the original design, contains more than 100,000 active transistors, including 2,500 bits of on-chip memory. Unisys engineers implemented the FX200K gate array using industry standard computer-aided design tools supported by Vitesse. The memory is an on-core macro cell chosen from Vitesse’s library of special function megacells. The new GaAs CPU is being offered as a board-level upgrade for existing A11s, offering 60% better performance on a transaction processing test.
NEW UNISYS A11 MAINFRAME IS BUILT AROUND VITESSE GaAs MICROPROCESSOR
