Instead of the Definicon DSI-780, INRO will soon start shipping the new generation of Definicon PM-030 co-processor boards. These new boards are binary compatible with their predecessors, but use the more advanced Motorola 68030 CPU, the 68882 FPU, and are running at clock rates of 25 and 33 MHz. As you can see from the benchmarks elsewhere in this issue, the PM-030 offers a speed increase of about 30% over the 20MHz version of the DSI-780. Since the same binaries are used for both board types, installations with multiple systems may mix the board types at will.
The Definicon DSI-32 co-processor board, based on the National Semiconductor 32032 processor, has been discontinued since beginning of 1989. While we still provide full software support for all existing DSI-32 licences which are covered by our software support agreement, hardware support may eventually become a problem. In order to encourage DSI-32 users to move up to newer and more powerful hardware, INRO is now offering a special upgrade discount for users switching from DSI-32 to Intel 80386 or PM-030 based systems. For details, contact INRO or your distributor.
Graphpoint, a company specializing in terminal emulation programs, is distributing TPORT, a Tektronix emulation device driver for PCs. This product is similar to the PlotDev driver from MicroPlot which is bundled with all PC licences of EMME/2, but it supports emulation of the full Tektronix 4115 protocol. We tested TPORT and found it working nicely with EMME/2. Since the driver uses about 300 kilobytes of memory (Plotdev uses only 32kb), TPORT cannot be used with the Intel 286 version of EMME/2. A device D002.IN table entry for TPORT is available from INRO.