The BeBox is a discontinued

personal computer A personal computer, commonly referred to as PC or computer, is a computer designed for individual use. It is typically used for tasks such as Word processor, word processing, web browser, internet browsing, email, multimedia playback, and PC ...

from

Be Inc. Be Inc. was an American computer company that created and developed the BeOS and BeIA operating systems, and the BeBox personal computer. It was founded in 1990 by former Apple Inc., Apple Computer executive Jean-Louis Gassée, who also served a ...

, running the company's

operating system An operating system (OS) is system software that manages computer hardware and software resources, and provides common daemon (computing), services for computer programs. Time-sharing operating systems scheduler (computing), schedule tasks for ...

, later named

BeOS BeOS is a discontinued operating system for personal computers that was developed by Be Inc. It was conceived for the company's BeBox personal computer which was released in 1995. BeOS was designed for multitasking, multithreading, and a graph ...

. It has two

PowerPC PowerPC (with the backronym Performance Optimization With Enhanced RISC – Performance Computing, sometimes abbreviated as PPC) is a reduced instruction set computer (RISC) instruction set architecture (ISA) created by the 1991 Apple Inc., App ...

CPUs, its I/O board has a custom "GeekPort", and the front bezel has "

Blinkenlights In computer jargon, blinkenlights are diagnostic lights on front panels of old mainframe computers. More recently the term applies to status lights of modern network hardware (modems, network hubs, etc.). Blinkenlights disappeared from more re ...

". The BeBox debuted in October 1995 with dual

PowerPC 603 The PowerPC 600 family was the first family of PowerPC processors built. They were designed at the Somerset facility in Austin, Texas, jointly funded and staffed by engineers from IBM and Motorola as a part of the AIM alliance. Somerset was opened ...

at 66 MHz. The processors were upgraded to 133 MHz in August 1996 (BeBox Dual603e-133). Production was halted in January 1997, following the port of BeOS to the

Macintosh Mac is a brand of personal computers designed and marketed by Apple Inc., Apple since 1984. The name is short for Macintosh (its official name until 1999), a reference to the McIntosh (apple), McIntosh apple. The current product lineup inclu ...

, for the company to concentrate on software. Be sold around 1,000 66 MHz BeBoxes and 800 133 MHz BeBoxes.

CPU configuration

Production models use two 66

MHz The hertz (symbol: Hz) is the unit of frequency in the International System of Units (SI), often described as being equivalent to one event (or cycle) per second. The hertz is an SI derived unit whose formal expression in terms of SI base u ...

processors Processor may refer to: Computing Hardware * Processor (computing) ** Central processing unit (CPU), the hardware within a computer that executes a program *** Microprocessor, a central processing unit contained on a single integrated circuit ( ...

or two 133 MHz

PowerPC 603e The PowerPC 600 family was the first family of PowerPC processors built. They were designed at the Somerset facility in Austin, Texas, jointly funded and staffed by engineers from IBM and Motorola as a part of the AIM alliance. Somerset was opened ...

processors to power the BeBox. Prototypes having dual 200 MHz CPUs or four CPUs exist, but were never publicly available.

Main board

The main board is in a standard AT format commonly found on PC. It used standard PC components to make it as inexpensive as possible. * Two PowerPC 603/66 MHz or 603e/133 MHz processors * Eight 72-pin

SIMM A SIMM (single in-line memory module) is a type of memory module used in computers from the early 1980s to the early 2000s. It is a printed circuit board upon which multiple random-access memory Integrated circuit chips are attached to one or ...

sockets * 128 KB Flash ROM * Three

PCI PCI may refer to: Business and economics * Payment card industry, businesses associated with debit, credit, and other payment cards ** Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard, a set of security requirements for credit card processors * Prov ...

slots * Five ISA slots * Internal

SCSI Small Computer System Interface (SCSI, ) is a set of standards for physically connecting and transferring data between computers and peripheral devices, best known for its use with storage devices such as hard disk drives. SCSI was introduced ...

connector * Internal IDE connector * Internal floppy connector * External

SCSI-2 Parallel SCSI (formally, SCSI Parallel Interface, or SPI) is the earliest of the interface implementations in the SCSI family. SPI is a parallel bus; there is one set of electrical connections stretching from one end of the SCSI bus to the o ...

connector *

Parallel port In computing, a parallel port is a type of interface found on early computers ( personal and otherwise) for connecting peripherals. The name refers to the way the data is sent; parallel ports send multiple bits of data at once (paralle ...

* Keyboard port, AT-style * Three GeekPort fuses * I/O Board connector * Front panel connector * Power connector

I/O board

The I/O board offers four

serial ports Serial may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media The presentation of works in sequential segments * Serial (literature), serialised literature in print * Serial (publishing), periodical publications and newspapers * Serial (radio and televisi ...

(9-pin

D-sub The D-subminiature or D-sub is a common type of electrical connector. They are named for their characteristic D-shaped metal shield. When they were introduced, D-subs were among the smallest connectors used on computer systems. Description, ...

), a PS/2 mouse port, and two joystick ports (15-pin D-sub). There are four

DIN DIN or Din or din may refer to: People and language * Din (name), people with the name * Dīn, an Arabic word with three general senses: judgment, custom, and religion from which the name originates * Dinka language (ISO 639 code: din), spoken ...

MIDI Musical Instrument Digital Interface (; MIDI) is an American-Japanese technical standard that describes a communication protocol, digital interface, and electrical connectors that connect a wide variety of electronic musical instruments, ...

ports (two in, two out), two stereo pairs of

RCA connectors The RCA connector is a type of electrical connector commonly used to carry analog audio and video signals. The name refers to the popular name of Radio Corporation of America, which introduced the design in the 1930s. Typically, the output i ...

audio line-level input and output, and a pair of 3.5 mm stereo phone jacks for microphone input and headphone output. There are also internal audio connectors: 5-pin strip for the audio CD line-level playback, and two 4-pin strips for microphone input and headphone output. The audio is produced with a 16-bit DAC stereo sound system capable of 48 kHz and 44.1 kHz. For the more unusual uses, there are three 4-pin

mini-DIN The mini-DIN connectors are a family of multi-pin electrical connectors used in a variety of applications. Mini-DIN is similar to the larger, older 13.2 mm diameter DIN connector. Design Mini-DIN connectors are in diameter and come in s ...

infrared (IR) I/O ports.

GeekPort

An experimental-electronic-development oriented port, backed by three fuses on the mainboard, the 37-pin D-sub "GeekPort" provides digital and analog I/O and

DC power Direct current (DC) is one-directional flow of electric charge. An electrochemical cell is a prime example of DC power. Direct current may flow through a conductor such as a wire, but can also flow through semiconductors, insulators, or even t ...

on the

ISA bus Isa or ISA may refer to: Places * Isa, Amur Oblast, Russia * Isa, Kagoshima, Japan * Isa, Nigeria * Isa District, Kagoshima, former district in Japan * Isa Town, middle class town located in Bahrain * Mount Isa, Queensland, Australia * Mou ...

: * Two independent, bidirectional 8-bit ports * Four A/D pins routing to a 12-bit A/D converter * Four D/A pins connected to an independent 8-bit D/A converter * Two signal

ground Ground may refer to: Geology * Land, the solid terrestrial surface of the Earth * Soil, a mixture of clay, sand and organic matter present on the surface of the Earth Electricity * Ground (electricity), the reference point in an electrical circ ...

reference pins * Eleven power and ground pins: Two at +5 V, one at +12 V, one at -12 V, seven ground pins

"Blinkenlights"

Two yellow/green vertical LED arrays, dubbed the "blinkenlights", are built into the front bezel to illustrate the

CPU A central processing unit (CPU), also called a central processor, main processor, or just processor, is the primary processor in a given computer. Its electronic circuitry executes instructions of a computer program, such as arithmetic, log ...

load. The bottommost

LED A light-emitting diode (LED) is a semiconductor device that emits light when current flows through it. Electrons in the semiconductor recombine with electron holes, releasing energy in the form of photons. The color of the light (corresp ...

on the right side indicates hard disk activity.

Market

Be called the BeBox: "the first true real-time, portable, object-oriented system that features multiple PowerPC processors, true preemptive multitasking, an integrated database, fast I/O, and a wide range of expansion options — all at an extremely aggressive price that is well below that of any competitive offering." BeBox creator

Jean-Louis Gassée Jean-Louis Gassée (born 24 March 1944) is a business executive. He is best known as a former executive at Apple Computer, where he worked from 1981 to 1990. He also founded Be Inc., creators of the BeOS computer operating system. After leavin ...

did not see the BeBox as a general consumer device, warning that "Before we let you use the BeBox, we believe you must have some aptitude toward programming the standard language is

C++ C++ (, pronounced "C plus plus" and sometimes abbreviated as CPP or CXX) is a high-level, general-purpose programming language created by Danish computer scientist Bjarne Stroustrup. First released in 1985 as an extension of the C programmin ...

Prototype

As of 1993, prototypes (at the time called Be Machine) had two 25 MHz

AT&T Hobbit The AT&T Hobbit is a microprocessor design developed by AT&T Corporation in the early 1990s. It was based on the company's CRISP (C-language Reduced Instruction Set Processor) design resembling the classic RISC pipeline, and which in turn grew ou ...

processors and three AT&T 9308S

DSP DSP may refer to: Computing * Digital signal processing, the mathematical manipulation of an information signal * Digital signal processor, a microprocessor designed for digital signal processing * Dynamic Reconfiguration port * Yamaha DSP-1 ...

s. In 2009, a rare prototype of the BeBox with Hobbit processors was sold at an auction.

Linux

Craftworks Solutions developed Be_Linux for the BeBox. Craftworks and Be Inc. announced in 1996 that they would work together to bring Be_Linux to the BeBox.

References

External links

* An interview with Be Inc. CEO

and VP of Engineering Erich Ringewald. * *
BeBox Photo Gallery (Joseph Palmer: Be HW Engineer)
* (BeBox) {{DEFAULTSORT:Bebox Be Inc. Computer-related introductions in 1995 Computer workstations Personal computers PowerPC computers