AT&T Global Information Solutions has finally given its five-year-old System 3000 line of Intel Corp iAPX-86-based commercial systems, originally launched by the then NCR Corp, a high-end, or enterprise makeover. The new Pentium-based, and Pentium Pro-ready, WorldMark servers include 4100, 4500 and 5100 models, which share a single cabinet design and are offered in various multiprocessing, clustered and massively-parallel configurations. The high-end 5100M massively parallel system features the long-awaited implementation of AT&T’s next-generation 20Mbps-per-node BYnet interconnect and supports up to 512 133MHz Pentiums across 16 subsystems with 32 processors per subsystem. It runs a Unix version of the Teradata database on a new 3.0 release of the AT&T System V.4 MP-RAS operating system. The 5100M delivers the long-promised upgrade route for users of AT&T’s existing Ynet-based 3600 system and back-end Teradata DBC/1012 systems, which were originally to have been merged in the well-publicised 3700 massively parallel processing unit which never saw the light of day (CI No 2,535).
TeradataOS
Designed for decision support, data warehousing and transaction processing, a dual-node 5100M with eight 133MHz Pentiums and the BYnet adaptor costs from $660,000. As well as Teradata version 2.0 – the database and its host TeradataOS operating system are now emulated as a front-end, virtual application under Unix, eliminating the requirement for additional back-end application processing modules – the 5100M supports Oracle parallel server. Informix XPS ships this month, while Sybase MPP, the former Navigation Server supposedly co-developed by Sybase and AT&T, is not seen until sometime next year. AT&T said only the Teradata option can accommodate applications with more than 1Tb data. The company will continue to support, but not enhance, the DBC/1012 Teradata engine, and is offering a set of tools to suck existing Teradata 1.X data into the 5100M. System administration and management is provided a deskside administration workstation. The 5100C – which supports Oracle Parallel Server and AT&T’s LifeKeeper fau lt-resilient software, but does not ship with BYnet – is tailored for transaction processing clustering and is regarded as the successor to the System 3575. A 5100C can accommodate two processor subsystems each with up to 32 90MHz or 133MHz Pentiums; up to eight 5100Cs can be clustered together. It starts at $465,000 with eight 90MHz Pentiums. The 5100S departmental symmetric multiprocessing server, with one processor subsystem, comes in for the System 3555, and costs from $235,000 with four 90MHz Pentiums. The 4500S – which picks up from the System 3525 – accommodates from two to 16 Pentiums and is due in the current quarter at from $82,000 in symmetric multiprocessing or clustered configurations. The 4100 desksides are available in 4100C clustered or 4150S and 4100S symmetric multiprocessing configurations with two to eight 90MHz or 133MHz Pentiums at from $58,000. The new systems use AT&T’s enhanced version of the IBM Corp Micro Channel Architecture bus.
