New DEC announcement, 7/11

[Steven D. Miller]

   DEC had a big product announcement on 7/11.  Since I haven't seen anything
here about the announcements, I thought I'd summarize what I know.  I'm almost
certain that other machines (in the VAX line at least, which I confess that I
pay little attention to) were announced; see your sales rep for more details.

   Here's the quick summary of what was announced:

	1) DECstation 2100.  This is like a 3100, but runs at a lower clock
	rate.  It's about 9-10 MIPS, but is otherwise identical to the 3100.
	The list price is substantially lower than on the DECstation 3100,
	and DEC claims that the 2100 meets or beats SPARCstation 1
	performance.  (DEC says the 2100 is $1K cheaper than the SS1, but I
	think they're both around $9K for an entry-level system.  The
	DECstation is probably a little bit cheaper.  I could just be
	confused...)

	2) DECserver 5400.  Features:

		MIPS R3000 chipset, 15-16 MIPS, 2.1 MFLOPS DP LINPACK,
		    4.8 MFLOPS SP LINPACK.
		16-64MB memory (I don't know about parity/ECC/whatever)
		I/O bus is the Q-Bus
		Packaging: BA213 pedestal or H9644 cabinet
		Disks --
			DSSI (RF series) or SDI (RA series) in general
			RF70 (400MB DSSI; 3 in BA213 package)
			RA90 (1.2GB SDI; 2 in H9644 package)
			RA70 (280MB SDI; 2 in H9644, plus RA90s)
		Expansion cabinets available
		Probably (I don't know) most QBus peripherals supported
		under VAX Ultrix work under RISC Ultrix

	3) DECserver 5810/DECserver 5820.  Features:

		MIPS R3000 chipset, 18-20 MIPS per CPU, 2.1/4.8 MFLOPS
		    LINPACK per CPU, 2 CPUs max; I suspect that plugging
		    in more CPUs will work, but I also suspect that two
		    saturate the XMI bus, and that's why DEC doesn't want
		    to sell this with more than two CPUs
		32-256MB memory (ECC)
		BI bus as I/O bus
		Packaging identical to VAX 6000 series (yes, CPU swaps
		   are technically feasible, though it's not clear yet
		   if there's any way to buy one)
		TK70 built in
		SDI disks; 2 RA90s fit in main cabinet, and can get expanders
		Supports KLESI tape controller, KDB50 disk controller,
		    DEBNI Ethernet controller, CI/HSC stuff, ttys, and
		    perhaps other BI stuff (I can only write so fast...)

   They all sound pretty neat.   Now if I could only find a way to justify
a 5820...

	-Steve

Spoken: Steve Miller    Domain: steve at mimsy.umd.edu    UUCP: uunet!mimsy!steve
Phone: +1-301-454-1808  USPS: UMIACS, Univ. of Maryland, College Park, MD 20742