This extremely rare Pixar Imaging Computer (PIC, P-II) is one of the original 120 machines produced by Pixar in an attempt to fill the technology gap they thought was missing from both computer generated graphics and later, scientific imaging systems.
Other than a few minor dings from storage, the mainframe is in good condition, however we are unsure of its working status. At some point in its history, the power supply failed and service was requested. The PS was disconntected from the system when we received it long ago and due to the lack of wiring diagrams, we did not want to attempt connecting it to the large DC wires inside for fear of truly damaging the system. Thus it sat for many years in the hope that we would come across the info we needed to attempt reconnection.
The PS and all boards look to be in excellent condition. We hope to find a home interested in either showcasing or possibly rehabilitating this truly marvelous piece of computer history with ties to both George Lucas, who started the PIC project, and Steve Jobs who later sunsetted it.
The History
In 1984, the Graphics Group, Lucasfilm's computer division, showed off the prototype of the Pixar Image Computer at the SIGGRAPH computer graphics conference, in addition to a partially-completed version of The Adventures of André & Wally B. having premiered there.
Released commercially for the first time on February 3rd, 1986, some time after Steve Jobs bought out the Graphics Group and renaming it Pixar, the Pixar Image Computer was intended for commercial and scientific high-end visualization markets, such as media production and medicine. It had a price tag of $135,000, but it had also required a $35,000 workstation from Sun Microsystems or Silicon Graphics to operate it. It proved to be ahead of its time, and had generated a lot of single sales. However, it did not sell in quantity.
In 1987, Pixar developed the second-generation Pixar II (P-II for short) image computer, a low-cost model which sold for $30,000.
In an attempt to gain a foothold in the medical market, Pixar donated ten machines to leading hospitals and sent marketing people to doctors' conventions. However, this had little effect on sales, despite the machine's ability to perform CAT scans and show perfect images of the human body. Pixar did get a contract with a manufacturer of CAT Scanners, which sold 30 machines. The terms were: Buy a million-dollar scanner, and get a $30,000 3D visualization system free. However, doctors were not trained to look at 3D, and could be sued unless they looked at the individual slices, as per their training. By 1988, Pixar had only sold 120 Pixar Image Computers.
In 1988, Pixar began development of the PII-9, a nine-slot version of the P-II. This machine was coupled with the world's first RAID (Redundant Array of Independent Disks) assembly, a high performance bus, a hardware image decompression card, four Channel Processors (CHAPs), very large memory cards (VME sized card full of memory), high resolution video cards with 10-bit DACs which were programmable for a variety of frame rates and resolutions, an overlay board which ran the NeWS windowing system, and finally, the 9-slot chassis. A full-up system was quite expensive, as the 3 GiB RAID was $300,000 alone. At this time in history, most file systems could only address 2 GiB of disk.
This system was aimed at high-end government imaging applications which were done by dedicated systems produced by the aerospace industry, which cost a million dollars per seat. The PII-9 and its associated software became the prototype of the next generation of commercial "low cost" workstations.
By 1990, the Pixar was defining the state-of-the-art in commercial image processing. However, the government decided that the per-seat cost was still too high for mass deployment, and to wait for the next generation systems to achieve cost reductions. This decision was the catalyst for Pixar to lay off its hardware engineers and shut down the hardware division on April 25th, 1990, ending the production of the Pixar Image Computer. There were no high volume buyers in any industry. Less than 300 Pixar Image Computers were ever sold.
The imaging business was sold to Vicom in 1990 for $2,000,000. Vicom filed for Chapter 11 within a year. Many of the lessons learned from the Pixar Image Computer had transitioned into the Low Cost Workstation (LCWS) and Commercial Analyst Workstation (CAWS) program guidelines in the early and mid 1990s. The government mass deployment that drove the PII-9 development occurred in the late 1990s, in the Integrated Exploitation Capability (IEC) program.
Technical Details
Channel Processor (CHAP)
The Channel Processor (CHAP for short) is a four-way parallel (RGBA) image computer made up of four 16-bit AMD 21116 bit-slice processors (each running at 10 MHz) and four Logic Devices LMU17 16 x 16 hardware multipliers in an SIMD (Single Instruction Multiple Data) architecture, which was ideal for imagery and video applications. It can execute instructions at 40 MIPS, making it 200 times faster than a DEC VAX-11/780, which was a popular system at the time. The CHAP processed four image channels in parallel; One for red, one for blue, one for green, and one for transparency (alpha channel). The CHAPs can communicate with each other and other peripherals over a 80 MB/sec YAPBUS (Yet Another Pixar Bus), and to picture memory (VRAM) across the 240 MB/sec PBUS (Processor Access Bus).
Specs
- No. of parallel processors per CHAP: 4
- No. of CHAPs per system: 1 to 3
- Data word width per processor: 16 bits
- Clock cycle time: <100 ns
- Control store memory: 16K words (96-bit words)
- Scratchpad memory: 16K x 16-bit words x 4 (64K words total)
- Memory bus bandwidth: 240 MB/sec
- YAPBUS bandwidth: 80 MB/sec
Memory
The PIC and variations thereof can accommodate 12 to 192 MB of image memory (VRAM), storing full-color pixels at 48 bits for each pixel. The pixels use 12 bits for red, green, and blue, plus 12 bits for the alpha channel. Memory bandwidth is at 480 MB/sec.
Interfacing to Host Machines
The PIC did not have a direct user interface, meaning that it cannot be used on its own. For this, it requires a Unix-based workstation acting as a host machine to operate it (at least to provide a keyboard and mouse), from brands such as Sun Microsystems or Silicon Graphics. The system interfaces to the host machine via the SYSBUS. It is used as a special-purpose graphics system for a variety of host machines, from personal computers to supercomputers. The host machine can be positioned up to 30 feet from the PIC.
