RISC-based systems are systems are shooting up into the stratosphere where the Windows NT systems snapping their heels can’t follow. Even Digital Equipment Corp, which will be found to have NT written on its heart when its corpse is exhumed, has remembered that its proprietary OpenVMS operating system can cluster mutiprocessor systems to create configurations that even the most reckless of NT users will only be able to dream wistfully about for many a long year. According to PC Week, DEC is developing two long-range projects for accelerating enterprise server bandwidth and extending clustering of OpenVMS systems. A new server, code-named Wildfire, will feature a mighty 32 of DEC’s forthcoming 500MHz 21264 processors and is intended for data warehousing, transaction processing and Internet applications. It is expected to feature a high-bandwidth system bus based on the upcoming Tsunami Alpha chip. And the Maynarder is also working on a scalable OpenVMS clustering technology codenamed Galaxies Software Architecture, which will cluster as many as 256 Alpha CPUs and support up to 200 input-output devices in a single server. Both products are expected in about 18 months.
