Fremont, California-based Micronics Computers Inc and Gateway 2000 Inc of North Sioux City, North Dakota have announced the joint development of a line of IBM-compatible personal computers featuring advanced Local Bus architectures: the 80486-based systems will offer video and peripheral input-output based on the Local Bus design, while maintaining compatibility by adhering to the announced VESA specification for Local Bus, VL-BUS; the Local Bus design is four to 10 times faster than typical bus designs such as AT or EISA, claims Micronics, and local bus architectures offer a 32-bit link between the CPU and Local Bus slots or on-board Local Bus devices; this link enables the bus to operate at the same speed as the system’s CPU; a system using a 33MHz 80486-based processor, for example, would be able to access the input output device over a 33MHz 32-bit bus.
