Pegasos

:"The present article is about the Pegasos computer platform. Pegasos may also refer to the horse Pegasus from Greek mythology."

Pegasos is a MicroATX motherboard powered by a PowerPC G3/G4 microprocessor, featuring 3 PCI slots, 1 AGP slot, two Ethernet ports (10/100/1000 & 10/100), USB, DDR, AC97 sound, and FireWire. Like the PowerPC Apple Macintosh counterparts, it boots via Open Firmware.

The Pegasos was sold by Genesi USA, Inc., and designed by their R&D branch bplan GmbH based in Frankfurt, Germany.

There are two versions of the system: The Pegasos I and the Pegasos II.

Pegasos I

The Pegasos I supports the IBM [http://www-306.ibm.com/chips/techlib/techlib.nsf/products/PowerPC_750CX_and_750CXe_Microprocessor 750CXe] CPU (G3), has 100 Mbit/s Ethernet onboard and uses PC133 SDRAM. It was discontinued after a hardware bug in the [http://www.mai.com/products/articia_s.html MAI Logic ArticiaS] Northbridge was discovered. Later versions of the Pegasos I came with a hardware fix which was designated "April". Further improvements were made in an "April 2" design which solved further problems. It has been replaced by the Pegasos II.

Pegasos II

The Pegasos II uses a [http://www.marvell.com/products/communication/discoveryII/index.jsp Marvell Discovery II] northbridge, removing the need for the "April" chipset fix on the previous model, and additionally offers integrated Gigabit LAN and DDR support, and the ability to use the Freescale "G4" processor line.

The 750CXe (G3) CPU boards do not require a cooling fan - it has been marketed as "cool computing". The current G4 boards based around the Freescale [http://www.freescale.com/webapp/sps/site/prod_summary.jsp?code=MPC7447 MPC7447] ship with a small fan. Passive cooling solutions are possible and sold with the "Home Media and Communication System", which is based on Pegasos II G4.

As with many small businesses, Genesi were forced to drop production of the Pegasos II after new RoHS legislation came into force.

Open Desktop Workstation

The Open Desktop Workstation, or ODW, is a standardized version of the Pegasos II. It was the first open source based PowerPC computer and gave PowerPC a host/target development environment. Genesi have released the complete specification (design and component listing) free of charge. The ODW-derived Home Media Center won the Best in Show award at the Freescale Technology Forum in 2005 [http://www.freescale.com/media_center/news_releases/2005/corp/06-21-05_FTF_BESTOFSHOW.html] , have a ATI certification [http://ati.amd.com/products/certified/genesi.html] and a "Ready for IBM Technology" certification. [http://www-304.ibm.com/jct09002c/gsdod/solutiondetails.do?solutionId=10567&lc=en]

* [http://www.powerdeveloper.org/platforms/pegasos/schematics ODW specification at PowerDeveloper.org]
* [http://www.freescale.com/webapp/sps/site/overview.jsp?nodeId=0162468rH3bTdGZj9N58582822 Linux resources for ODW at Freescale]

Specification

* Freescale 1.0 GHz MPC7447 processor
* 512 MB DDR RAM (two slots, up to 2 GB)
* 80 GB ATA100 hard disk
* Dual-Layer DVD±RW Drive
* Floppy disk support
* 3x PCI slots
* AGP based ATI Radeon 9250 graphics (DVI, VGA and S-Video out)
* 4x USB
* PS/2 mouse and keyboard support
* 3x FireWire 400 (two external)
* 2x Ethernet ports, 100 Mbit/s and 1 Gbit
* AC97 sound - in/out, analog and digital (S/PDIF)
* PC game/MIDI-port
* Parallel and serial ports (supporting IrDA)
* MicroATX motherboard (236×172 mm)
* Small Footprint Case - (92×310×400 mm)

Operating system support

Several operating systems run on the Pegasos Platform. Genesi is very eager to support any efforts to port and optimize operating systems or applications for their computers.
* Linux distributions including Debian GNU/Linux, MontaVista Linux, openSUSE, Yellow Dog Linux, Gentoo Linux and Crux PPC are also available for the Pegasos. Support for the Pegasos as a platform device has been integrated into the Linux kernel mainline as of kernel version 2.6.13.
* Mac OS – It is possible to run Mac OS and Mac OS X on the Pegasos using Mac-on-Linux, but doing so is reportedly in violation of Apple's EULA. [http://www.terrasoftsolutions.com/products/faq/mac-os.shtml]
* MorphOS is broadly compatible with legacy Commodore Amiga applications which profess to be "OS friendly" (meaning they do not access native Amiga hardware directly), as well as a growing number of native applications. Genesi is the primary sponsor for MorphOS.
* OpenBSD – Genesi hired a developer in 2002 to port OpenBSD to the Pegasos II. Both Pegasos I and Pegasos II boards were supported. The relationship ended poorly in 2004 with the developer not being paid for the work that he has done (due to Genesi's cashflow problems), and due to lack of documentation from Genesi/bPlan, support was completely removed after one release cycle. [http://www.openbsd.org/pegasos.html] [http://marc.info/?l=openbsd-misc&m=108028112117093&w=2]
* OpenSolaris – Genesi/Freescale is initial supporter of the OpenSolaris port to PowerPC and the Pegasos II being used as the reference platform for development.
* QNX supports the Pegasos platform. [http://www.qnx.com/partners/partner.html?partnerid=161488]
* Symobi is available as demo image.

External links

* [http://www.pegasosppc.com/ PegasosPPC]
* [http://www.genesippc.com/ Genesi]
* [http://www.pegasosforum.de/ Pegasos Support Forum & Community]
* [http://www.pegasos.org/ Pegasos User Group Sweden]
* [http://www.blastwave.org/ Polaris (OpenSolaris PowerPC) development]
* [http://obligement.free.fr/articles/pegasos.php Review of the Pegasos on Obligement magazine]
* [http://obligement.free.fr/articles/pegasos2.php Review of the Pegasos II on Obligement magazine]
* [http://wikipeg.free.fr/ThePegasosBook/ The Pegasos book] - Free ebook about the Pegasos PowerPC and its operating systems (MorphOS, Linux, Mac OS X with Mac-on-Linux).