Newsgroups: comp.sys.transputer
From: co1dll@sunc.sheffield.ac.uk (D Lamptey)
Subject: Re: WARP Board For Amiga?
Organization: Academic Computing Services, Sheffield University
Date: 27 Jan 1994 15:49:33 GMT
Message-ID: <2i8nqd$4m9@silver.shef.ac.uk>

E. John Love (E._John_Love@tfbbs.wimsey.com) wrote:
: Has anyone heard about a Transputer board for the Amiga computer called
: WARP?  I think US Cybernetics makes it, and I'm trying to find out more
: about it.  Any information is greatly appreciated!

: Cheers!!
: -- Via DLG Pro v1.0

Hello. There has been no news forthcoming from U.S. Cybernetics for a while..
This is (an edit of ) the info that I originally got:

The Warp Board
--------------
  The device used in the WARP board is the T805; this is a 32-bit, 30
Mips/3 MFlops transputer with on-board 64-bit floating point unit.  Mips
ratings aren't really something to take too seriously for any processor,
but our preliminary testing on a MandelBrot calculation program
indicates that the WARP board runs somewhere between 6 and 10 times
faster than an A3000 with 68882 coprocessor.

  There will be two varieties of WARP board; the first is a PIC for the
amiga, the second is a module which will plug into an external box.  The
ironmongery is still under development, but the external box will
probably hold up to 40 modules.  Of course, you can connect up more than
one external box if you want even more processors.

  The PIC has DMA access to amiga memory, allowing a high
amiga-transputer communications rate.  Transputer-transputer
communications are provided via the links and are at the rate of 2 Mb/s
per link.

  The current board to board interface will be supported for all future
products,  so you will not have to junk your existing boards in 5 years
time when the next generation of processors appear - they can still be
sitting in a corner of the network doing some useful work.


The OS
-------
  The WARP board runs our proprietary OS which is loosely based on the
amiga OS.  Extended message functions allow messages to be passed
between processors in a manner which is transparent to applications.
Messages may even be passed back and forth between two or more amigas on
the same network. Libraries allow  amiga tasks to use the same functions
as are  available on the transputer; a properly written program will
compile for both the amiga and transputer without any changes.  The OS
is fully multi-tasking and supports fork-type threads as well as simple
parallel tasks.  The OS can automatically load a task onto every
processor in the network, so it is not necessary to know the network
configuration at compile-time.

  Although most programs may be run on the transputer with minimal
changes, to take full advantage of multiple processors it is usually
necessary to redesign the program to some extent.  Fortunately, the
redesign required for most renderers/ray-tracers is fairly trivial.
The porting process is made easier by a large number of run-time error
requesters - eg an attempt to put a message to an invalid port will
result in a requester detailing the processor, task name, error, and
other pertinent information.

  We are currently in negotiation with INMOS to port their compiler to
the amiga - our ideal would be to bundle their compiler with the board,
but obviously we are dependent upon them for this, so no promises
yet....  On the plus side, we are committed to providing a high level of
support to our customers, and will be setting up an email list for
techical support and general discussion of the product and related
topics.


Availability
------------
  We hope to have the board out by Christmas - maybe even by the end of
November.  There will also be a T9000 board with approximately 10 times
the performance but it is unlikely that this will be out in less than a
year.



It said last year, but I haven't spoken to the developers in a while..
They were in discussions with compiler makers, I think for devel/debug
tools, etc. Steven Spielberg's company (Amblin Ent.) use Amigas almost
exclusively for animation, and I think they were going to get them to
beta-test the boards....
No further news, though.. Sorry. Ask Neil McMullen at U.S.Cyb. He's
on neil@powerstor.cuc.ab.ca


Derryck.


