ICL Plc has lowered the entry point to its Series 39 SX line of ECL mainframes and doubled the power at the top end with its first three- and four-processor models in the new series. It reckons that the top-of-the-line four-node configuration delivers 172 IBM Corp MIPS. The new models are the SX 370-10 uniprocessor, the 430-20 two-node system, the 590-30 and 620-30 three-node systems and the 650-40 four-node machine. It rates them at 9, 17, 89, 130 and 172 IBM MIPS. The additions at the top give a 100:1 power range within the VME operating environment, which ICL reckons is the highest currently offered under a single operating system. Memory comes in 64Mb and 128Mb modules up to a maximum of 512Mb per node. The new low-end machine brings the entry pricing to the SX line down to UKP550,000. The company also introduced a solid-state secondary store, Extended Systems Storage, offered as controller pairs with two, four, six or eight volumes of 610Mb each with optional CAFS-ISP. The PP250 is a new non-impact printer designed for up to 500,000 a month, and capable of doing 50 A4 pages a minute and the LPS40 off-line continuous stationery printer doing up to 197 pages a minute.
