Instead of offering customers of its Teradata back-end parallel database processor a direct migration route up to the promised System 3700 massively parallel machine, originally due around the beginning of this year, NCR Corp will this week advise them that the existing Intel Corp 80486-based System 3600 should provide them with their next upgrade path, Unigram reports. When NCR announced its plan to buy Teradata Corp back in December 1991, users of the El Segundo, California-based firm’s DBC/1012 mainframe-class back-end database processor were told that they, and users of the NCR System 3600 equivalent, would continue to be supported, but that the upgrade path for both would be a new System 3700 machine which would rely on Teradata technology. NCR is this week expected to announce general availability of a range of application processor enhancements to the DBC/1012 based on the System 3600, which it says will enable the two technologies to become fully integrated. NCR says applications developed on the 3600 using Unix databases like Oracle and Sybase will be able to use Teradata’s decision support functionality. DBC/1012 users will be able take advantage of archive storage facilities without needing a mainframe. They will be able to implement multiple database strategies, get increased access to on-line processing facilities and get links to a Unix system for general application development. NCR says Model 2 DBC/1012 users should consider migration to a Model 4 or to an NCR 3600. The 3600 may be the better option, it says, especially where there are plans for functions that the Unix application processor supports, such as the use of the merchant relational databases for general purpose processing. DBC/1012 Model 3 and Model 4 users can scale up to take advantage the 3600 by adding access module processors interface processors, communication processors and disks, as well as connecting multiple 3600s via the Ynet high-speed interconnect system. Model 3 users may want to move to the 3600, the company adds, saying the Unix application processor enhancements or the 3600 itself can be a migration path for Model 4 users, an option it says is already being considered by some DBC/1012 customers. NCR says it is committed to supporting the DBC/1012 – planned enhancements include release 5.0 and 5.1 of new software, the addition of 80486- and Pentium-based application processor modules and new disks arrays. NCR denies that this latest move signals the end of the 3700, saying plans are still in place for such a system – which is positioned as an absolute performance engine – though no timescales were offered. Other reports suggest NCR has delayed beta shipments of the 3700 – apparently because of engineering issues – until the first half of next year. That, observers suggest, is why the smaller 3600 system which takes up to 100 CPUs – is being repositioned to take advantage of the Teradata opportunities. The 3700 is expected to use Pentium processors – the 3600 will be upgraded to Pentium early next year. Teradata is now a part of NCR’s large computer products division; NCR closed the European equivalent back in January.
