The announcements by LSI Logic Corp of the new SparKit-20 chip set and the licensing agreement with Sun Microsystems Inc for support chips means that Sun is effectively handing over its Sparcstation 1 business over to the Milpitas, California company to concentrate on the Sparcstation 2, due for launch this week. Under the agreement, LSI is permitted to offer the ASIC devices developed for the original Sparcstation 1 worldwide. The original ASIC chipset, augmented by LSI Logic’s L64801 integer unit, and an optional L64804 floating-point unit will be packaged with the ASICs as the SparKit-20, which complements the higher end SparKit-25 and SparKit-40 announced in March. The SparKit-25 and SparKit-40 families each consists of seven devices; the new SparKit-20 runs at 20MHz and provides 12.5MIPS performance. It consists of the L64821 memory management unit, L64822 data buffer, L64824 cache controller, L64826 RAM controller – two are needed, L64825 video controller, L64823 clock, L64853 DMA Controller, and L64801 integer unit. The L64804 floating-point unit is optional. The SparKit-20 is available now in sample quantities, the 25MHz versions follows by year end and the 40MHz in first quarter 1991. In plastic packages it costs $1,000 in 5,000-piece quantities, including software licensing fees for SunOS binaries. Pricing for the optional L64804 floating-point unit, also in 5,000-piece quantities, is $150. And LSI has announced 11 companies that are building Sparcstation-compatible systems – everything from battery-powered laptops to high-performance workstations – using the sets: the 11 include a Mexican company, Intelecsis SA de CV and the DCM Data Products computer subsidiary of the venerable Delhi Cloth Mills Pte Ltd of New Delhi. The others are Chicony Electronics Co Ltd, Taiwan; CompuAdd Inc, DTK Computer Co, Taiwan; Hyundai Electronics, Korea; Northgate Computer Systems Inc, US; Research, Development & Innovations Inc; US; and Sampo Technology Corp; Tatung Co and Twinhead International Corp, all Taiwan.
