IBM Corp’s first pass at a parallel processor, the Power Visualisation System, which costs from $600,000 to $2m and uses an RS/6000 as the front end (CI No 1,723) uses up to 32 Intel Corp 80860 RISCs as the parallel processing elements. Designed primarily to process and display data from a supercomputer, the system comes in three models – the 7245-001, which consists of an eight-processor Visualisation Server with 256Mb memory to the 003 with 32 processors and 768Mb memory. With optional features and attachments it can go to 1.5Gb memory and two full-duplex High Performance Parallel Interface channels. It can be attached to the Power Visualisation Video Controller, which provides high-resolution video capability, including support for high-definition television monitors, and to a HIPPI-attached Disk Array Subsystem with capacity of up to 170Gb. It is designed for displaying data in applications from computational fluid dynamics to measurements of natural phenomena such as seismic analysis. It uses an RS/6000 Model 530 as the front-end and can support other models of the RS/6000 on a local net running the AIX Visualisation Data Explor er/6000 licensed program. The machines are available in the US in November and are to be announced internationally in due course.
