As promised early this year (CI No 2,693), Data General Corp has launched a family of Pentium-based AViiON servers. Scaling to up to eight processors and capable of being clustered, the servers will be targeted as cheap machines for value-added resellers, departmental and workgroup application servers. By using iAPX-86 technology, the company is following in the footsteps of companies like Compaq Computer Corp, reasoning that in the mid-range, people want inexpensive machines that are capable of running the vast array of iAPX-86 applications. Data General said customers will be able to run more than 15,000 applications under DG/UX, as well as Windows NT, on the AViiONs. The long-planned shift to iAPX-86 architecture is also part of a move to improve declining AViiON sales and push the company back into profit. At the low end are the deskside AV 2000, a one- to two-way 100MHz system, and the AV 3000, a one- to four-way configuration. At what the company calls the enterprise level come the AV 4700 and AV 4800. The former is a one to two-way system with 133MHz Pentium, field upgradable to the AV 4800 four-way systems; both are towers. Above them is the AV 5800, a rack system with up to eight 133MHz Pentiums, which the company said offered 100 times the performance that of the original AViiON. All three have C-Bus II technology and PCI controllers. In the first half of next year expect AViiONs with the P6 and in the second half of the year clustering courtesy of Non Uniform Memory Architecture.
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