Sun Microsystems Inc has taken to heart criticism from the field that there is nothing on the Sparc road-map past UltraSparc, and would like everybody to remember something we quoted it saying almost a year ago (CI No 2,377): the UltraSparc-III, which was then described as a 600+ SPECint92 chip, could actually be the beginnings of a next-generation Sparc line. After some dickering about the meaning of words, Sun is now willing to call it a new core and says UltraSparc-III is to UltraSparc what P6 is to Pentium. Naturally all the software will be compatible. One thing that seems to have changed in the intervening year is III’s availability. A year ago the Sparc Business Unit was saying it was due at the end of 1996. Now it is talking sampling and p roduction in 1998 and has moved UltraSparc-II, which it thought would be seen at the end of this year, squarely into next. Sun thinks it can be more definite with III’s specifications next month, so stay tuned.
