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Indy Desktop Workstation

[The Indy Desktop Worktstation] The Indy workstation from Silicon Graphics easily runs your applications, while fitting into your environment and your budget. Indy delivers standout performance and powerful creative and collaborative features to your workgroup. The visual computing power and heterogeneous communications capabilities of Indy allow you and your team to work faster and smarter.

Supports the Most Demanding Applications

The Indy workstation's high-performance architecture, combined with the leading applications in MCAD, color publishing, graphic arts, scientific applications, the World Wide Web, content authoring, software development, and film and video, gives you the richest, most powerful solutions available. In addition, Insignia SoftWindows provides a Windows environment for supporting a wide range of Windows-based productivity applications.


Fits into Your Environment

Integrated Ethernet and ISDN connect Indy to local and wide area networks. Additional network options, including TokenRing, FDDI, ATM, and X.25 may be supported via the two GIO option slots. An optional 21MB floptical drive lets you read and write PC and Macintosh floppies.


High-Performance Architecture

Indy supports a range of CPU choices, from the economical MIPS R4600PC to the powerful MIPS R5000SC with secondary cache. The Indy workstation's advanced 64-bit architecture has a dedicated 400MB/sec bus which connects the memory subsystem to the CPU, maximizing the benefit of fast RISC processing. The I/O subsystem moves data from the 133MB/sec GIO ports to the system bus via special ASICs that efficiently queue the slower external data onto the fast, 267MB/sec internal bus.


Outstanding Price/Performance

Indy runs your applications faster than fully configured PCs for roughly the same price. This is due to an integrated high-performance system architecture, with standard Ethernet and ISDN networking, a range of fast CPUs, and graphics choices. The new MIPS R5000 processor is a dual-issue superscalar CPU designed to accelerate OpenGE graphics, bringing a new generation of CPU technology to power-hungry users.


Easy Expandability

The Indy system's modular design is easily expandable and protects your investment by incorporating important subsystems on separate modules. Upgrade to the latest CPU or hardware-accelerated 3D graphics, or add any of more than 50 GIO expansion options in the two high-speed GIO expansion slots.


Easy to Learn, Easy to Use

The Indigo Magic graphical user environment blends the simplicity of a familiar icon-driven interface with the power of UNIX. Simple graphical tools put the creative power of digital media at your fingertips. Unlike many other graphical environments, Indigo Magic also provides simple interfaces for system administration and management, including on-line documentation and menu-driven tools for simplifying configuration and maintenance.


The Out-Of-Box Experience

Included with standard Indy systems is the Out-Of-Box Experience. Rich with multimedia, this interactive tutorial guides new users through the capabilities and creative potential of the Indy workstation.

You can capture, create, and visually communicate your ideas to virtually any system on your heterogeneous network using simple graphical tools. This provides your team with the ability to collaborate effectively via a variety of methods, to almost any system, saving time and effort by working smarter, not harder.


Powerful Visual-Computing Servers

Backing the power of the Indy desktop workstation is the full line of CHALLENGE servers, beginning with the single-processor CHALLENGE S and scaling to the 36-processor CHALLENGE XL server. The Indy workstation brings visual computing to the server world, enabling you to take full advantage of the industry-leading file, database, and supercomputing server power of Silicon Graphics products.


Collaboration and Communication

Gain a creative advantage with the Indy workstation's powerful integrated digital and analog audio, video, and graphics capabilities. Included with every Indy workstation, the Desktop Special Edition software is a collection of applications, tools, and utilities which enable Indy to easily integrate into existing environments and increase the productivity of your workgroup.


Unrivaled Digital Media

Unlike many other computer systems which offer only playback, Indy provides rich multimedia support to help you import sound, images, and video into your work. Bundled media hardware and tools, including the color digital IndyCam and microphone, let you incorporate 3D graphics, photo-realistic images, video, and CD-quality audio into your work in real time. The IndyCam digital camera is ideal for collaborative workgroup communications, allowing you to take advantage of bundled Inperson videoconferencing software. The video subsystem performs filtered scaling to 1/2, 1/3, and 1/4 screen, and IndyCam can capture full-resolution, full-frame video directly to memory in true digital format. CD/DAT-quality audio includes four channels of analog audio and two channels of digital audio. Inexpensive third-party software supports full-motion MPEG1 and video CD playback.


[Indy Workstation Rear View]
Graphics Choices

Technical and creative professionals alike will appreciate the high-resolution XGE and XGE24 graphics subsystems of Indy, which provide tremendous imaging, 2D, and 3D performance. Indy works with amazing speed: up to 1.5 million X11 lines per second and 60 million pixels per second at 1280x1024 screen resolution and up to 76Hz refresh rates. Using Indy XGE graphics, you can manipulate images at up to 1.5M 2D vectors and 1.2M 3D vectors per second.

The MIPS R5000 CPU contains a special vector-processing unit, which enables parallel execution of floating-point instructions critical to 3D graphics. This drives the XGE graphics of Indy to performance previously achieved only by using dual Geometry Engine processors. For even greater 3D performance, Indy XZ dedicates 128 MFLOPS via four hardware Geometry Engine processors to accelerate your graphics work. Indy brings affordable interactive 3D performance to your desktop with XGE and XZ graphics.


Video Options

The built-in video accepts a variety of standard video inputs, including S-video and composite PAL/NTSC in addition to the digital video interface for IndyCam. For professional-quality video, the IndyVideo option adds print-to-tape and SFX capabilities, including real-time overlays, dissolves, fades, wipes, chroma keying, and luma keying in square pixel or CCIR-601 format. Working in conjunction with the IndyVideo option is the CosmoCompress motion JPEG video compression card, which gives Indy real-time video compression and decompression. CosmoCompress works with IndyVideo and powerful software applications to let you explore new horizons in video production, digital video distribution, motion video analysis, and video-based training. Its powerful video capabilities include nonlinear editing and full-resolution, full-frame rate, real-time playback of special effects, composites, and animations from disk. With a combination of CCIR601 video I/O and compression, video professionals have a complete solution for working in digital component video and performing the highest quality motion JPEG compression.


[Indy Workstation Top View] 1. IndyCam. This fully digital camera with adjustable focus and a CCD array delivers a full-resolution 640x480 digital video signal to the built-in video subsystem.

2. High-Bandwidth System Architecture. The 64-bit system bus enables industry-leading 267MB/sec sustained throughput; this high-speed bus combined with high-performance custom ASICs and the 64-bit MIPS RISC family of CPUs gives Indy unsurpassed application performance.

3. High-Capacity Memory Subsystem. Two-way interleaved memory system accomodates up to 256MB and is powered by a 400MB/sec memory bus, enabling very fast memory access and I/O throughput for data sets.

4. Upgradeable CPU module. Modular CPU implementation provides for easy upgrades to more processing power today and in the future.

5. Built-In Video Subsystem. Dedicated video-in ASIC incorporates full-resolution, full-color, and full-frame rate video directly into the high-speed system architecture.

6. Built-In Digital Audio Subsystem. Like the video-in subsystem, the audio subsystem is fully integrated on the 64-bit system bus and provides four independent channels of CD-quality audio output, as well as two audio input channels.

7. Expandability. Two drive bays allow you to expand your disk space to 4GB internally or add a floptical drive that reads and writes Macintosh or PC floppies as well as 21MB floptical media.


Indy Technical Specifications

Indy CPU Performance Chart:

                     R5000PC      R5000SC     R5000SC
                     @150MHz      @150MHz     @180MHz

Cache (primary)      32kd/32ki   32kd/32ki   32kd/32ki
Cache (secondary)        -         .5MB        .5MB
SPECint95               3.1         3.7         4.1
SPECfp95                3.6         4.2         4.4
AIM (Suite VI)         164.8       191.5       200.1


Indy XGE Graphics Performance:

                        R5000PC      R5000SC     R5000SC
                        @150MHz      @150MHz     @180MHz

XLines/sec               1.4M         1.5M        1.5M
3D Vectors/sec           1.2M         1.2M        1.2M
Tmesh/sec Shaded (Z)      71K          81K         96K
Screen Clear             3msec        3msec       3msec
DMA Pixel Xfer 8-bit      57M          58M         60M
DMA Pixel Xfer 24-bit     47M          47M         47M


Indy XZ Graphics Performance:

3D Lines/sec                           920K
3D Lines GouraudZ, Depth Cued/sec      446K
Tmesh, Flat NO-Z/sec                   402K
Tmesh, GouraudZ, Lit/sec               180K
Quads, FlatZ/sec                       127K
Quads, GouraudZ, Lit/sec                91K
Characters                             240K
Screen Clear                          9msec
Rectangle Fill Rate/sec (500x500)   40M pix


Hardware Features

CPU Module        R5000PC 150MHz
                  R5000SC 150MHz
                  R5000SC 180MHz
Graphics          8-bit XGE
                     1280x1024/1024x768
                     up to 76Hz refresh rate
                     (upgradable to 24-bit)
                  24-bit XGE
                     1280x1024/1024x768
                     up to 76Hz refresh rate
                  XZ 24-bit HW Accelerated Z
                     1280x1024
                     1024x768 (Indy Presenter only)
Monitor           Color 20-inch
                     1280x1024 resolution
                     50-76Hz refresh rates
                  Color 17"
                     1280x1024 resolution
                     50-76Hz refresh rates
                  Color 15"
                     1024x768 resolution
                     70Hz refresh rate
                  Flat panel 13"
                     Active matrix LCD
                     1280x1024, 18-bits/pixel
                  Flat panel 12"
                     Active matrix LCD
                     1024x768, 15-bits/pixel
Input/Output      2 serial, 1 parallel
                  Ethernet, (10Base-T or AUI)
                  Fast SCSI-2, ISDN,
                  Stereovision (17" and 20" monitor only)
Memory            16MB to 256MB
Mass Storage      Two internal devices:
                     (3.5" x 1" form factor)
                  21 MB floptical drive
                  535MB hard disk
                  1GB hard disk, 2GB hard disk
GIO Expansion     Two GIO-32 slots
Input Devices     PS/2 keyboard and mouse
                  Analog microphone
                  IndyCam: full-color CCD 640x480 resolution
Warranty          One year hardware


Graphics Features

Color Maps        4 (256 color)
                  1 (4096 color) 24-bit only
Display Modes     RGB double buffer
                  RGB single buffer
                  Color index double buffer
                  Color index single buffer
Pop-Up/Overlay Planes    8-bit XGE: 2-bits/none
                         24-bit XGE: 2-bits/8-bits
                         XZ: 4-bits/4-bits
Video             Independent input video bus
Input             2 analog video-in ports
                  (S-Video and Composite)
                  NTSC and PAL support
                  1 digital video-in port
                  320x240x20fps to disk
                  640x480x30fps to memory
Audio
Input             Mono/stereo microphone
                  (mono microphone incl.)
                  Line-level stereo analog
                  AES/EBU digital stereo
Output            External volume controls
                  Stereo headphone
                  Mono internal speaker
                  Line-level stereo analog
                  AES/EBU digital stereo
Sampling Rates    48, 44.1, 32KHz, and more
Connectors        Five 1/8" (3.5mm) stereo jacks


Software Features

IRIX 6.2          UNIX System V.4, XPG4 Base 95
                  Profile branded by X/Open
                  Company Ltd., IEEE POSIX 1003.1,
                  FIPS 151-2, X11R6 Window
                  System, OSF/Motif Rel 1.2.4,
                  Display PostScript, XFS high-
                  availability filesystem with
                  guaranteed-rate I/O, OpenGL
Indigo Magic      Media User Interface, IRIS
                  Showcase 3.3, Media Tools,
                  MediaMail, Photo-CD support,
                  Inperson, WchSpace Navigator,
                  Netscape Navigator,
                  Mindshare OutBox


SGI Accessories Supported

Indy Carrying Case             Indybag
GIO Options (single wide)      IndyVideo, CosmoCompress (full-motion )PEG)
                               Indy Video 601 (2 single-wide)
                               Ethernet, Fast SCSI-2 X.25, TokenRing
GIO Options (double wide)      FDDI single attach (fiber only)
                               (GIO options not available with XZ graphics)
Tablet                         Hitachi 1111C
External Drives                SyQuest
External Tapes                 1.0GB QIC
                               2.0GB DAT
Input Devices                  Dials, dials and buttons, optical mouse
Other External Devices         CD-ROM, MIDI interface, 1GB/2GB external disks


Physical Environment

System                 3" H x 16" W x 14" D
                       16 lbs.
20" Monitor            18.5" H x 18.5" W x 19.7" D
                       81.4 lbs.
17" Monitor            16.1" H x 15.7" W x 17.7" D
                       55 lbs.
15" Monitor            14.2" H x 13.4" W x 16.5" D
                       52.8 lbs.
Flat Panel 12"         18.5" H x 12.5" W x 1.1" D
                       7 lbs.
Power Requirements     100-132 VAC, 2.4-1.8A
                       200-264 VAC, 1.2-0.9A
                       47-63Hz
Heat Dissipation       900 BTU/hour
Ambient Temperature    +13 to +35 degrees C (operating)
                       -40 to +65 degrees C (non-operating)
Relative Humidity      10% to 80% operating (no condensation)
                       5% to 95% non-operating (no condensation)
Altitude               10,000' operating
                       40,000' non-operating
Vibration              0.02", 5-19Hz
                       0.25 G, 5-500Hz
Noise                  36 dBa in typical operating position


Regulatory Agency Approvals

Electromagnetic        FCC Class B
Emission               Canada DOC. Class B
                       CISPR 22 Class B
                       Germany VDE Class B
                       VCCI Class 2
Product Safety         CSA 22.2 No. 950, UL 1950,
                       IEC 950, EN 60950, Class 1 SELV
Ergonomic/Health       Germany ZH1/618, ISO 9241


For more information please call:

U.S. 1(800) 800-7441              Intercontinental 1(415) 933.46.14
Europe (41) 22-798.75.25          Latin America 1(415) 933.46.37
Asia Pacific (81) 3-54.88.18.11   Canada 1 (905) 625-4747

Silicon Graphics World Wide Web Server
URL: http://www.sgi.com/

Corporate Office

2011 N. Shoreline Boulevard,
Mountain View, CA 94043
(415) 960-1980

220 (6/96)


Typed up by Ian Mapleson (mapesdhs@yahoo.com) on 29/Jul/2002
Original document dated June 1996.


Ian's SGI Depot: FOR SALE! SGI Systems, Parts, Spares and Upgrades

(check my current auctions!)
[WhatsNew] [P.I.] [Indigo] [Indy] [O2] [Indigo2] [Crimson] [Challenge] [Onyx] [Octane] [Origin] [Onyx2]
[Future Technology Research Index] [SGI Tech/Advice Index] [Nintendo64 Tech Info Index]