MIPS Computer Systems Inc is hoping to return some of the industry fire it has been drawing of late when it delivers a range of systems based on its own R4000 RISC part in the second week of April. As we went to press the launch was, by all accounts, still scheduled to go ahead, despite MIPS’ proposed acquisition by Silicon Graphics Inc. The launch will see at least four, and possibly up to half a dozen machines aimed at the commercial market, including low-end workstations and servers. Prices have not yet been firmed up, but the boxes are believed to have been positioned above the entry-level price points of the low-end offerings from Sun, IBM, DEC and Hewlett-Packard, but with greater performance and more commercially attractive design features. MIPS says it has spent considerable time on ASIC integration to bring the final chip tally of the systems down as much as possible. The Advanced Computing Environment ARC-compliant deskside and desktops will include all the bells and whistles that the R4000 architecture allows. They’ll run MIPS’ RISC/os Unix, but being ARC systems they’ll also support Santa Cruz Operation Inc Open Desktop, Unix System Labs Unix System V.4 and Microsoft Corp NT, along with a choice of desktop managers. In the UK, MIPS will aptly launch its ARC boxes at a roll-out being staged in the near-complete London Ark, a green, high-tech Noah’s Ark-like building that has sprung up in drab surroundings alongside the A4 Great West Road into central London at Hammersmith. MIPS’ Swedish European boss, Kristoffer Sygel is understood to be a friend of the Swedish architect, Ralph Erskine, who designed the Ark, which is being built by Ake Larson.
