Kendall Square Research 1 (KSR1) Supercomputer CPU chips

[keyman]

In 1995, iirc, I purchased a bunch of material from Kendall Square Research when they went out of business. Part of that material was their stock of custom CPU chips for their KSR1 and KSR2 massively parallel supercomputers.

They used 4 different chips to implement the 64 bit CPUs. These chips were: the Cell Execution Unit, the floating point unit, the arithmetic logic unit, and the external I/O unit (XIO). More information on the company and the systems can be found on Wikipedia. The picture of the CPU board shows the use of at least 6 part numbers for the KSR custom chips on the board.

These chips have been sitting in storage for the last 15-16 years. It is well past time that I at least investigate selling them. All of the dies were packaged using Tape Automated Bonding (TAB) resulting in a very thin and lightweight chip.

The ones that I expect to sell here would only be those that are in good cosmetic condition. The ones that are not in good cosmetic condition will most likely be sold for their scrap gold value.

In the attached pictures you will find examples of what they look like. I have been able to find 1 and only 1 of the ones that have the silver colored traces. It is highly unlikely that the traces are actually silver; they are probably some other platinum group metal. I believe that I obtained more than one of these, but I am unable to find them at this point. I thus must assume that they have been lost/destroyed.

There are several different chips, and versions of chips, with gold traces. All of which appear near identical. The visual differences are A) in the quantity of solder mask used near where the lead-frame attaches to the die, and B) primarily in the part number written on the chip.

The amount of solder mask used I expect is from different manufacturing runs. The part numbers can be the same for two chips showing different amounts of solder-mask. Given my engineering experience with TAB chips my expectation is that the ones with a lesser amount of solder-mask are pre-production versions as the additional solder-mask makes the overall chip more robust and would have been something they changed to rather than changed away from. In the attached pictures are an example of two part number 3-1338-01 chips one of which has the pre-production solder-mask and one which was production.

The part numbers for these chips were not laser-scribed on to them. The labeling was done with a printed label which was then affixed to chip. There are several different part numbers.
The primary chips are:
3-1333-01
3-1334-00
3-1335-01
3-1336-01
3-1337-01
3-1338-01

Based on the board pictured in the Wikipedia article I expect that the 4 chips of the "CPU" are:
3-1333-01
3-1334-00
3-1335-01
3-1336-01

The additional 2 chips:
3-1337-01
3-1338-01
are most likely memory control, bus interface and much of the other logic necessary to have the CPU as part of a system.

I do not actually know which chip serves which function. The above are educated guesses based on the layout of the board pictured in the Wikipedia article. While at one time I had several such boards, I no longer have one to the best of my knowledge.


In addition, there are several other part numbers which appear to be non-production chips. These include:
3-1338-02
3-1338-00
3-1338-00 (Hand modified to -00) [1 only]
1-1335-01 [1 only]
3-1335-00 (crossed out with over-sticker CCU5-0) [1 only]
IPU5-0 (has a non-standard sized under-sticker which is completely covered) [1 only]
unknown with top of die exposed.

I have not gone through all of the chips, and may never do so. Thus, there may be some other part numbers which I have not found, and I may have more than one example of the ones I have stated are 1 only. My taking the time to sort through chips depends on the level of interest (i.e. time is money).

If provenance is something that people care about I can probably find the original receipt for my purchase for the material from KSR. However, doing so would take considerable time going through old boxes on my part. I am reluctant to spend that time without a good reason.

Several pictures are attached here, or in my next post showing a variety of the chips.

[Neon_WA]

very nice & unique

personally i would like ones in not so good condition.. thou scrapping is quick & easy for you

[keyman]

Here are some additional pictures.

I have attempted to provide a significant amount of information in my previous post. If you have any questions, feel free to ask.

Is there interest in these chips?

[Neon_WA]

[Plutonium]

Very nice chips!
I am interested in one full set of these chips (in perfect condition).

[hugo929]

im interested A set in not so good condition

[lither]

i am intersted in one set too

[smithy]

I would be interested in a set as well

[smithy]

I'm sure there is enough interest here to buy them all from you. How much would you want per set?
If you sell them all through here you would only need to ship to one location (Oregon) and in one package, as most of us have our cpus shipped there, so could save you lots of effort as well.

[vezhlys]

Yes, I am interested too in any condition . Interesting and unusual chips.

[johnorun]

I would be interested in some in not so perfect condition also.

[isa-d]

For a good price I'm interested in one set

[Fossalta]

Interested here aswell

[CPUShack]

I would definitely take a set of 6 (or 4)

Thanks!

[naked1300]

For a good price I'm also interested in one set!