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"Motorola is thrilled to be the first in the industry to reach 300 MHz for the volume market with the PowerPC 603e microprocessor. Our technology allows us to provide our customers with a significant performance and price/performance advantage when bringing new systems to market," noted Tom Gunter, corporate vice president and general manager, Motorola RISC Microprocessor Division.
With this announcement, Motorola greatly exceeds its previously-stated availability goal of reaching 300 MHz on PowerPC 603e microprocessors by the end of 1997. PowerPC 603e microprocessors at 300-, 275- and 250 MHz are manufactured using an advanced process technology at Motorola's MOS 13 semiconductor wafer fabrication facility. Motorola has taken advantage of its sophisticated wafer fabrication technology, developed by the Advanced Products Research and Development Laboratory (APRDL), to deliver these higher-speed microprocessors. Both APRDL and MOS 13 are located in Austin, Texas.
The high performance and low power consumption of the entire 603e family enables manufacturers to build systems ranging from subnotebooks and laptops to high-performance notebooks and desktop systems.
"I am impressed with Motorola's rapid improvement in its manufacturing technology, becoming the first microprocessor maker to reach the .25-micron mark," noted Linley Gwennap, senior analyst at MicroDesign Resources. "This leadership technology enabled the 603e to reach 300 MHz, a faster clock speed than any other mainstream PC processor."
"Motorola's 300 MHz PowerPC 603e microprocessors enable us to offer the fastest mainstream desktop system in the marketplace. The Power Macintosh 6500 series offers powerful capabilities, accelerated multimedia, seamless Internet connectivity and advanced video capture, edit and publishing options," said Guerrino De Luca, Apple executive vice president of worldwide marketing. "The high performance and low power consumption of the 603e microprocessor also help make the new Apple PowerBook 3400 the industry's fastest notebook computer. Apple is committed to delivering simple, powerful, high-quality products for our customers."
"PowerPC technology has jumped way ahead of the microprocessor competition with today's announcement," said Dennis Schneider, vice president and general manager, Commercial Products Division, Motorola Computer Group. "This new processor will extend the Motorola StarMax line of Mac compatibles, giving users incredible performance and value."
"We are consistently impressed by the price/performance advantages of the PowerPC architecture, but with these new high-speed 603e processors, we are just amazed!," said Peter Mehring, vice president of R&D and general manager of UMAX Computer Corporation. "Motorola has enabled us to deliver such a high level of system performance at such a low price, that folks will be astounded by our next round of product announcements."
"Power Computing continues to push the envelope in bringing customers the fastest systems at unbeatable price points," said Stephen Kahng, founder and CEO, Power Computing Corp. "Motorola's introduction of the 300 MHz PowerPC 603e and our continued partnership with Motorola is yet another step in this direction."
Available immediately, the PowerPC 603e microprocessors are priced at $333, $476 and $618 for the 250-, 275- and 300 MHz versions, respectively, when purchased in quantities of 1,000.
This powerful new 603e microprocessor's reduced die size of 42 sq. mm results in higher speeds, lower power consumption and lower heat dissipation. Operating in the 3.5 w typical power dissipation range required in a portable environment, the 603e chips have a 2.5v core and 3.3v I/Os, a 16KB instruction cache, a 16KB data cache and 2.6 million transistors. The 300 MHz PowerPC 603e microprocessor has an estimated SPECint95 of 7.4 and an estimated SPECfp95 of 6.1.
Motorola's industry-leading process technology will allow for the introduction of low-cost devices offering up to 300 MHz-performance levels later this year for the embedded market. These cost-effective PowerPC 603e derivatives will be optimized specifically for embedded applications. The small die size and low power dissipation of the Motorola PowerPC 603e microprocessor, coupled with its high performance, is very attractive for performance-oriented embedded applications, such as high-end printers, imaging and infrastructure for the networking and telecommunications industries. Emerging applications, such as network computers, thin clients and interactive set top boxes, will also benefit from the excellent price/performance provided by this advanced technology.
With 1996 worldwide sales of $7.9 billion, Motorola's Semiconductor Products Sector is the largest U.S.-based broad line supplier of semiconductor solutions. Motorola is one of the world's leading providers of wireless communications, semiconductors, and advanced electronic systems, components, and services. Major equipment businesses include cellular telephone, two-way radio, paging and data communications, personal communications, automotive, defense and space electronics, and computers. Motorola semiconductors power communication devices, computers and millions of other products. Motorola's 1996 sales were $28 billion.
Motorola is a registered trademark of Motorola Inc. PowerPC, PowerPC 603 and PowerPC 603e are trademarks of International Business Machines Corporation, used under license therefrom.