John - Large Xeon Systems coming from Sequent, Unisys & Data General
These could add a few bucks to Intel's bottom line.
Paul
{===========================}
techweb.com
October 05, 1998, Issue: 735
Section: News & Analysis
PCs Or Mainframe Wannabes?
Mitch Wagner
Vendors are seeking to enthrone PC servers in the glass house by giving them
mainframe-class scalability.
Such ultra-high-end PC servers, scaling to 64 CPUs, are designed to augment
mainframes and, in the long run, replace them. They will run mainframe-class
enterprise resource planning (ERP), transaction processing and database
applications, as well as serve as middle-tier application servers.
Sequent Computer Systems Inc. plans to ship on Oct. 26 a 64-processor
server running Intel's Pentium II Xeon chip. The company also plans this week
to announce 16-processor Xeon servers running both Unix and Windows NT
in a single box, with SAP AG's R/3 business applications preinstalled.
Data General Corp. plans to announce its 64-processor Xeon server this
month, but with an unknown availability date. Unisys Corp. plans to release a
32-processor Xeon system next year. And Hitachi PC Corp. plans to
announce today an eight-processor Xeon system with availability in
December.
Before deploying PC servers, however, users said they would want to do
extensive testing to ensure that I/O throughput and stability are comparable to
mainframes and adequate for 24-by-7 enterprise chores.
"I wouldn't want to immediately switch over from a mainframe and bet my
career on it," said Chip Childress, director of information systems at Holston
Medical Group.
Indeed, reliability is a key differentiator between more robust mainframes and
other servers.
"We're beginning to approach the performance of the mainframe with PCs,
but we still need to address the availability and reliability of those systems,"
said Dataquest analyst Jerry Sheridan.
Sequent said it plans to use its Non-Uniform Memory Architecture (NUMA)
technology in its 64-processor box. Groups of four processors, known as
"quads," have their own local memory. The system will run Windows NT and
Sequent's Unix.
The ability to run dual operating systems is of significant value in light of
Windows NT's current instability, said Steve Wanless, Sequent's senior
marketing manager.
The dual Windows NT/Unix server from Sequent is designed for SAP users,
Wanless said. NUMAcenter for SAP will let SAP applications run on
Windows NT, while databases for SAP will run on the more stable Unix
operating system, with the software communicating across the interconnect.
Unisys, meanwhile, said it plans next year to introduce a series of enterprise
PC servers, code-named "Nth Power." The line starts with two-, four- and
eight-way systems in mid-February; a 16-processor system debuts in the third
quarter; and a 32-processor workhorse will come in the fourth quarter.
The systems use Unisys' Cellular MultiProcessing (CMP) architecture, a
parallel-processing system that groups servers into "cells" of four processors.
The system will concurrently run Windows NT and Unisys' proprietary
ClearPath mainframe operating system, and also will support SCO UnixWare
and Solaris.
Indeed, Unisys plans to replace its proprietary ClearPath CMOS processors
with Intel IA-64 chips, beginning in 2002, a spokesperson said.
Hitachi's eight-way VisionBase8880 will ship with Windows NT. The system
also will be certified to run UnixWare and Solaris. Pricing will start at about
$100,000, with a typical configuration priced at $160,000.
Data General declined to provide specifics on its server.
Copyright ® 1998 CMP Media Inc. |
