IBM Corp is planning to offer support for a forthcoming parallel system within its Sysplex system for clustering ES/9000 mainframes according to information filtering out of briefings that the company has been giving to analysts on a non-disclosure basis. The parallel system is presumably the one being built using the Intel Corp 80860 RISC as a stop-gap to the forthcoming 64-bit version of the Rios RISC (CI No 2,001). The price-performance level of the new system is believed to be 25% below existing mainframes, and the parallel system is said to be a true open systems offering. And Intel RISCs feature widely in IBM’s universe: according to Electronic News the company has switched to the 80960 embedded RISC for the controller of its new 9337 disk array subsystem from the MC68000 family parts it previously used for the function. IBM told the paper that the 80960 beat a number of other parts, including its own Power RISC. The Motorola Inc 68020 continues to feature in the new AS/400 input-output processors, in a new version with double the data transfer rate – 8Mbytes per second against 4Mbytes. The 9337 needs the new input-output processor as well as the new release of OS/400. Motorola designed the 68000 family so that it could be customised, in particular with an alternative instruction set microcoded in, and IBM’s version of the part is a custom implementation.
