intro —
introduction to sparc special files and hardware support
This section describes the special files, related driver functions, and
  networking support available in the system. In this part of the manual, the
  SYNOPSIS section of each configurable device gives a sample specification for
  use in constructing a system description for the
  config(1) program. The
  DIAGNOSTICS section lists messages which may appear on the console and/or in
  the system error log /var/log/messages due to errors
  in device operation; see
  syslogd(8) for more
  information.
This section contains both devices which may be configured into
    the system and network related information. The networking support is
    introduced in
    netintro(4).
This section describes the hardware supported on the SPARC platform. Software
  support for these devices comes in two forms. A hardware device may be
  supported with a character or block device driver, or it may
  be used within the networking subsystem and have a network
  interface driver. Block and character devices are accessed through files
  in the file system of a special type; see
  mknod(8). Network interfaces
  are indirectly accessed through the interprocess communication facilities
  provided by the system; see
  socket(2).
A hardware device is identified to the system at configuration
    time and the appropriate device or network interface driver is then compiled
    into the system. When the resultant system is booted, the autoconfiguration
    facilities in the system probe for the device and, if found, enable the
    software support for it. If a device does not respond at autoconfiguration
    time it is not accessible at any time afterwards. To enable a device which
    did not autoconfigure, the system must be rebooted.
The autoconfiguration system is described in
    sparc/autoconf(4).
    A list of the supported devices is given below.
config(1),
  cd(4),
  ch(4),
  le(4),
  scsi(4),
  sd(4),
  sparc/autoconf(4),
  sparc/bwtwo(4),
  sparc/cgeight(4),
  sparc/cgfour(4),
  sparc/cgfourteen(4),
  sparc/cgsix(4),
  sparc/cgthree(4),
  sparc/cgtwo(4),
  sparc/fd(4),
  sparc/kbd(4),
  sparc/magma(4),
  sparc/mem(4),
  sparc/ms(4),
  sparc/openprom(4),
  sparc/tcx(4),
  ss(4),
  st(4),
  uk(4)
The following Sun SPARC system architectures and models are supported:
  - sun4
- first generation SPARC systems on VMEbus:
    
 Sun 4/100 series (14.28 MHz)
 Sun 4/200 series (16.67 MHz)
 Sun 4/300 series (25 MHz)
- sun4c
- desktop SPARC systems with Sbus:
    
 SPARCstation 1 (20 MHz)
 SPARCstation 1+ (25 MHz)
 SPARCstation 2 (40 MHz)
 SPARCstation SLC (20 MHz)
 SPARCstation ELC (33 MHz)
 SPARCstation IPC (25 MHz)
 SPARCstation IPX (40 MHz).
- sun4m
- desktop SPARC systems with Mbus for CPUs, and Sbus:
    
 SPARCclassic (50 MHz microSPARC I)
 SPARCstation LX (50 MHz microSPARC I)
 SPARCstation 4 (70 MHz microSPARC II)
 SPARCstation 5 (70, 85, 110 MHz microSPARC II)
 SPARCstation 5 (170 MHz TurboSPARC)
 SPARCstation 10M (36 MHz SuperSPARC I)
 SPARCstation 20M (50 MHz SuperSPARC I)
 SPARCstation 10 (Mbus modules)
 SPARCstation 20 (Mbus modules)
The SPARCstation 2 and IPX can be upgraded with a Weitek PowerUP
    CPU that is clock-doubled (i.e. internally it runs at 80 MHz).
    NetBSD supports this configuration.
Hardware level clones of these systems from other manufacturers
    will likely work (e.g. Xerox, Tatung, Axil, Cycle); other systems which have
    a SPARC CPU but do not use Sun's hardware architecture (e.g. Solbourne) will
    likely not work.
The sun4m architecture with Mbus modules for the CPUs is supported
    with the following modules with only one CPU:
  - SM41
- 40 MHz SuperSPARC I with 1MB SuperCACHE
- SM51
- 50 MHz SuperSPARC I with 1MB SuperCACHE
- SM61
- 60 MHz SuperSPARC I with 1MB SuperCACHE
- SM71
- 75 MHz SuperSPARC II with 1MB SuperCACHE
- SM81
- 85 MHz SuperSPARC II with 1MB SuperCACHE
- HS11
- 100 MHz Ross Technology hyperSPARC
- HS21
- 125 MHz Ross Technology hyperSPARC
- M151
- 150 MHz Ross Technology hyperSPARC
This list is not exhaustive; NetBSD is
    continuously being improved, and may well run on Mbus CPU modules not listed
    here.
There is also some support for Sun JavaStation computers based on
    the microSPARC CPU.
NetBSD does not yet properly support
    multiprocessor systems, but will run on one processor of a multiprocessor
    system.
The Sun 4/400 series, and sun4d (SPARCcenter 1000, 1000E, and
    2000) are not supported.
The sun4u (UltraSPARC 64-bit) architectures are supported by
    NetBSD/sparc64.
The devices listed below are supported in this incarnation of the system.
  Devices are indicated by their functional interface. Not all supported devices
  are listed.
  - audio
- AMD 79C30 obio (sun4c) and dbri (sun4m) audio controller
- bpp
- Bi-directional Parallel port
- bwtwo
- black and white obio frame buffer
- cgeight
- 24 bit VMEbus color frame buffer
- cgfour
- 8 bit obio (sun4 P4 bus) color graphics frame buffer
- cgfourteen
- 24 bit Sbus color frame buffer
- cgsix
- 8 bit obio (sun4c & sun4m), Sbus color graphics frame buffer
- cgthree
- 8 bit VMEbus, Sbus, and obio (sun4m) color graphics frame buffer
- cgtwo
- 8 bit VMEbus color frame buffer
- dbri
- Dual Basic Rate Interface (BRI) ISDN (SPARC LX & SPARCstation 10)
      (only the audio component is supported)
- eeprom
- Sun non-volatile configuration RAM driver
- esp
- NCR53C90 ESP100 (Sun 4/300), ESP100A (sun4c), ESP200 (sun4m) SCSI
      controller
    
 FSBE/S (X1053A, part # 501-2015) Fast SCSI-2/Buffered Ethernet Sbus
      controller
- fd
- Intel 82072 obio (sun4c) or Intel 82077 obio (sun4m) floppy disk drive
      controller
- ie
- Intel 82586 Ethernet controller (Sun 4/100)
- isp
- Qlogic ISP Sbus SCSI controller
- kbd
- Sun type 2, type 3, type 4, and type 5 keyboards (on zs)
- le/lebuffer
- AMD 7990 LANCE Ethernet controller (Sun 4/200, 4/300, sun4c, sun4m,
    Sbus)
- magma
- Magma Sp Serial/Parallel board device driver
- ms
- Sun mouse (on zs)
- openprom
- Sun Open boot PROM (what became IEEE 1275) configuration driver
- power
- sun4m power management; the
      halt(8) and
      shutdown(8) commands
      can use it to power down the system.
- si
- NCR5380 "SCSI-2" VMEbus (Sun 4/200, Sun 4/400) SCSI
    controller
- sw
- NCR5380 obio (Sun 4/100) "SCSI Wierd" SCSI controller
- tcx
- 8 or 24 bit Sbus color graphics frame buffer
- xd
- Xylogics 753/7053 VMEbus SMD disk controller
- xy
- Xylogics 450/451 VMEbus SMD disk controller
- zs
- Zilog 8530 serial controller
The following devices are not supported, due to unavailability of either
  documentation or sample hardware:
  - dbri
- Dual Basic Rate Interface (BRI) ISDN (SPARC LX & SPARCstation 10)
This sparcintro appeared in NetBSD
  1.3. Large chunks of text carefully recycled (shamelessly appropriated)
  from NetBSD/pmax intro.