• Tag Archives technology
  • Digital Archaeology: Hewlett Packard Z220

    The Z220 SFF was a small form factor workstation from Hewlett Packard. When I think workstation, I generally think of relatively large, powerful machines with lots of room for expansion. To be fair, while this is a small form factor machine, it did come with pretty powerful options. Mine includes the following:

    • CPU: i5-3570 @ 3.4 GHz
    • RAM: 16 GB DDR3-1600 / PC3-12800
    • Video: AMD FirePro V3900
    • Hard Drive: Seagate ST3250410As (250 GB)

    For more detailed hardware info, checkout the reports from HWiNFO and CPU-Z.

    The CPU in this one is more mid-range but i7 and Xeon processors were available with this model. So while it’s definitely not very expandable, It still made for a reasonably powerful workstation…at least if you don’t need multiple CPUs or higher end GPUs.

    As mentioned above, the CPU in this machine is a mid-range option. The two most power CPUs available for it are the i7-3770 and the Xeon E3-1290v2. This Xeon and i7 are pretty close in terms of specs. The Xeon has a slight clock speed advantage and uses a little bit more power. Oddly, various benchmarks I’ve seen show the i7 coming out on top slightly. I have no idea why but it would seem to be the best choice for this machine especially given that it uses a little less power than the Xeon. the i7 is essentially the same as the i5 except that the i7 is hyperthreaded and the i5 is not.

    This machine already has a reasonably healthy amount of RAM at 16 GB. Officially, it supports up to 32 GB. I’ve seen people ask whether or not you can use 16 GB DIMMs in this machine but haven’t seen a definitive answer.

    Because of the limitations of the power supply, GPU choices are somewhat limited. Not to mention the fact that you need to use a low profile card. For a more modern upgrade, you could probably use something like a GT 1030 or GTX 1650…something that you can find a low profile version of and that doesn’t take an external power connector.

    This machine isn’t old enough to really consider it to be “retro”. At least I don’t. In fact, it still works perfectly well as a modern machine. It’s plenty fast enough as is for pretty much anything most people do on a computer. It’s only if you are interested in modern gaming or something that requires more computational muscle (like video processing or AI) that you would find this machine a bit lacking. There’s also still a modest upgrade path. A higher end i7 or Xeon processor will give you better multitasking capabilities and you can take it up to 32 GB if you feel the need. Even a somewhat more powerful video card is possible along with, of course, an SSD drive. This machine is not supported by Windows 11 but this seems to only be because of Microsoft’s attempts at intentional obsolescence. There are ways to install Windows 11 if you really want to or Linux works just fine as well.

    Like all of the machines I use, I’ve installed BOINC and have it attached to several projects. When powered on, it is crunching tasks for Einstein@home, Milkyway@home, Asteroids@home, Rosetta@home and World Community Grid. You can also see how it is doing overall at FreeDC.


  • Byte (March 1981)

    Source: Byte – March 1981

    Computer magazines have been around for a really long time. Or may I should say ‘were’ at this point as you can find no general computer magazines on the shelf these days. Anyway, Byte was first published starting in 1975. This issue is from March 1981 which was still roughly six months before the IBM PC was introduced. There were still plenty of home computers from Commodore, Atari, Apple and others as well as numerous CP/M based machines and other unique computers. This issue weighs in at almost 400 pages and includes:

    Features

    • Structured Programming and Structured Flowcharts – An introduction to structured programming which could be accomplished in virtually any language with a goto statement.
    • Build the Disk-80: Memory Expansion and Floppy-Disk Control – A do-it-yourself hardware project in which you build an expansion interface for the TRS-80 model I that includes both expanded memory (up to 32K) and a floppy disk controller.
    • Three-Dimensional Computer Graphics, Part 1 – The part in a series on generating 3D polygonal graphics. Mostly this goes over the math involved.
    • What is Good Documentation? – A guide to producing good hardware and software documentation with minimal jargon.
    • A Beginner’s Guide to Spectral Analysis, Part 2 – Part 1 introduced ideas behind the Fourier transform. This part extends those ideas into two-dimensional space. Includes examples in 6502 machine-language.
    • A Simple Approach to Data Smoothing – Techniques to smooth out statistical fluctuations in data in order to find underlying trends.
    • The New Literacy: Programming Languages as Languages – A comparison of computer/programming languages vs. human languages.
    • Computer Music: A Design Tutorial – This article starts out by saying “The computational power necessary to synthesize high-quality, polyphonic computer music in real time exceeds the resources of the currently available microprocessors.” How far we have come. This article covers one approach to frequency synthesis.

    Reviews

    • The Micro Matrix Photopoint Light Pen – Light pens were once a popular way to interface with a computer. Ultimately, the mouse took over that roll. This review looks at one such light pen and some software that supports it.
    • What’s Inside Radio Shack’s Color Computer? – A detailed and technical look at the then new Tandy Color Computer. The Color Computer featured the partially 16-bit MC6809E CPU and up to 16K. While Radio Shack supported the Color Computer for more than a decade, it never really gained the popularity of machines like the Apple II, Atari 400/800, Commodore 64, VIC-20, etc. There are no good sales numbers but best guess seems to be that about 500,000 units were sold all the CoCo models combined. I had a neighbor that had a Coco 3 back in the day.

    Nucleus

    • Editorial: Is This Really Necessary? – An editorial on design techniques.
    • Letters – Letters from readers about technical writing, Intel’s educational products, SuperBrain upgrade costs, muSIMP for the TRS-80 Model I, and more.
    • Programming Quickies – Short BASIC programs for computing the determinant of a Matrix and displaying constellations.
    • Languages Forum: A Coding Sheet for FORTH – A form for creating a graphical representation of the stack in FORTH.
    • Byte’s Bits – News bits including an IEEE study on terminals, a computer camp for kids 10-18, an online service for the TI-99/4, research for using computers to aid the handicapped, and more.
    • Technical Forum – A BASIC program that converts object code to data statements; a comparison of addition and subtraction operations between the 1802 and Z-80 processors; and a design for a simple video switch.
    • Desk-Top Wonders: Hunt the Wumpus with Your HP-41C – A type in version of this popular (at the time) game for the HP-41C programmable calculator.
    • System Notes: Software Addressing Modes for the 8080 – Various ways of addressing memory on the 8080 processor.
    • Bytelines – The latest personal computer related news including a new software copyright law, a new 68000 S-100 bus based computer, a 5 Megabyte hard drive for under $2000, sales of Japanese made computers drop sharply in the U.S., wristwatch-sized computer proposed, the Cray-1 and CDC Cyber 205 top the list of the worlds fastest computers, work begins on plasma and LCD based flat panel displays, experimental robot destroys itself at the University of Florida, Xerox introduces first Ethernet system, IBM opens retail stores, ex-employee fined $50,000 for stealing his former employers software and using it in a competing business, Federal auditors discover over 200 government employees using computers at the Sandia Nuclear Weapons Research Center for things like playing games, and much more.
    • Ask Byte – Questions answered about building a modem, home automation with the X-10, upper and lower-case letters on the TRS-80 Model II, and more.
    • What’s New? – A look at new products including an 8088-based board for the S-100 bus; a new microcomputer from DTC featuring 64K RAM, an 8085A-1 CPU, and more; the IMP2-Apple printer designed for the Apple II; the Model 7728 Centronics Printer Interface for the Apple II; a new family of 3.19 to 11.5 megabyte 5-inch hard drives from Tandon; the new VIC-20 computer from Commodore; and more.

    …and more!