PPC Boards?

[James Bredijk]

Grant,
  I'm looking to do some 'mad scientist' type of experimenting with the
PPC. I hope to 'play' with both the 'System' & 'Embedded' PPC platforms,
but I'm not looking to spend $2600 on the Motorola SandPoint board just so
I can fill up my afternoons.

  Just like everyone else in the developer game, my resources are limited
(I'm a part-time consultant who has returned to college as a part-time
student). I've spent quite a bit on solid texts covering OS Dev, Compilers
& Languages, Programming, IPC, HW Arch, etc. etc. I've also purchased &
read over a dozen PPC books (I've even got a copy of IBM's PPC Compiler
Writer's Guide). After doing Mac (and Mini & Unix &, alas, PC) programming,
I know that I want (or is it must) work with the PPC platform (but not
necessarily the Apple flavor).

  I was hoping to purchase a Motorola Excimer board (URL
http://www.mot.com/SPS/PowerPC/teksupport/refdesigns/ ), but decided that
the limited functionality may not be worth the investment of time & money.
I also had trouble when I tried to purchase the board. One electronics
reseller said that I wasn't allowed to purchase it because I wasn't a
certified Motorola End User, and another said that since I was only looking
for one that I wasn't worth their effort to sell to.

  I started looking around for alternatives, but found that they were
either very expensive ( http://www.cogcomp.com & IBM) or they just didn't
respond to my requests for information ( http://www.vicomp.com &
http://www.plxtech.com ). Some places, like Phytec ( http://www.phytec.com
) looked interesting, but didn't offer the 'System' PPC board options (I'd
like to start with System PPC, and then move to Embedded PPC), and only had
PPC555 & PPC509 modules. I had no luck finding a reseller for the offerings
from Motorola Computer Group ( http://www.mcg.mot.com ).

  I didn't find any mention of the IBM 'Walnut or Oak' boards that you
referred to, but I am rather cross eyed from reading 1000's of web pages,
and very well could have missed it. Is there a reseller who specializes in
(or at least has a complete offering of) eval boards/dev kits?? I haven't
found one yet, but many of the web sites that I've been to aren't very
'research friendly'. Any pointers (pun intended) would be _great_.

Thanx for your help,
James

----
James Bredijk
jbredijk at nac.net

"When I read a URL on the back of my fortune cookie's fortune,
I knew the world would never be the same."


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