Sybase Inc claims that the recently announced Release 3 of its Sybase SQL-based relational database management system is 100% faster than its Release 2.1 precursor, and can offer the kind of performance previously available only with mainframe computers. Substantiation is provided in the form of reports which confirm that during TPI-based transaction processing performance trials with 600 simulated users, the Sybase Dataserver was measured at 29.3 transactions-per-second and a 0.68 second response rate on a VAX 8700, and 22.7 tps and a 0.88 response time on the Pyramid 9820: on a Sun-3/280 simulating 450 users, Sybase performance was 19.1 tps and a response time of 0.78 seconds. Sybase also claim that Release 3.1 of the product – due to be shipped in the current quarter – is the first of its kind to offer fault tolerant features for VAXcluster, VAX, Sun and Pyramid machines. Essentially, it offers on-line recovery in the shape of a Companion Server, running on a separate CPU in a VAXcluster environment, and provides VAX, Sun and Pyramid users with software mirrored databases and transaction logs. Additional Release 3 performance enhancements include overlapped input output, shared buffers and commits, locking and network organisation, while single-user performance levels have been upped by improved memory usage, buffering and optimisation of query processing paths. Initial licence prices for the Dataserver range from UKP14,550 to UKP21,850 for Sun-3 and Sun-4 respectively, UKP14,550 for the DEC MicroVAX through to UKP72,750 for the top-end VAX 8800, and from UKP7,300 for the Pyramid workcentre through to UKP72,750 for the 9840: Companion Server prices will be fixed at 10% of the original licence fee right across the VAX range.
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