After flirting with advance looks at hardware improvements, HP finally made a commitment to deliver the durable goods for HP 3000s within the next few weeks. Customers who have pined for faster systems and bigger backup got details on advances in high-end 3000s, high-speed bandwidth and high-capacity peripherals and backup at the HP World conference.
The Series 997 systems first introduced as upgrades in May got a formal introduction as standalone systems at the HP show last month, with new performance positioning. HP said the 997s offer a 25 percent performance boost over the 8-way Series 996 systems. MPE/iX 5.5 Express 3 is required to run the latest hardware.
HP also noted that the other performance boost at the 3000 high-end -- the 9- through 12-way Series 996 systems -- weren't to be confused with the 997 as the top of the line. The newest configurations of Series 996s are meant to serve as performance enhancers for select HP applications. They may have more than twice as many processors as a Series 997, but the biggest 996s aren't a sure path to the best performance numbers.
That honor appears to fall to the new 997s, systems that HP spokesperson David Greene said double the performance of comparable 992 systems. He also added that "we positioned the 9-to 12-way 996s as a fairly specialized installation for specific applications. As a result we don't use that as the basis for commonly available performance comparisons. There's no longer a typical environment in a 12-way configuration running really big applications."
Instead of more horsepower in a single system, HP will be delivering on the promise of horizontal growth with a new configuration of its Shareplex/iX product. Called the Shareplex/iX-NetBase Cluster, the bundle is a subset of the full range of software from Quest that includes shadowing, AutoRPM and Network File Access features. HP will offer the Cluster at a price more than entry-level NetBase shadowing and less than a full bundle. Quest will not sell the Cluster, but will instead OEM the software to HP.
"You get more than you need in the full Shareplex bundle," Greene said. "This is tailored more for horizontal-growth applications as opposed to pure maximum availability applications."
HP also extended the I/O availability of the midrange 9x9 servers by giving customers another pair of card cages to plug into the systems. A new card plugs into a 9x9 server slot and accepts one or two cages. By adding both cages, customers can get another 28 slots for mass storage peripherals and DTC devices. HP said the enhancement makes it more feasible for customers to do what they've wanted to do with the midrange 9x9s -- use them as high-end systems.
"We're responding the reality that customers can run their larger applications on these systems," Greene said. "They haven't had the level of connectivity you needed to provide all the mass storage those applications needed." Increasing performance in the 9x9s made using the systems for large applications more possible. HP may have been eyeing the fall introduction of a 989 system in providing the extra I/O capability, although the vendor didn't do more than hint about that forthcoming system.
HP also announced the Stacker Autoloader for DDS-3 tape backup, a device that queues up as many as six DAT cartridges for long-term backups. By using compression a single set of backup tapes can hold 144Gb of data, giving smaller sites a way to back up unattended over a week's time without changing tapes. HP is only supporting the device for serial use of the tapes, one after another, rather than using a true jukebox design.
HP World announcements also included 100 VGAnyLAN and 100-Base-T
networking for the HP 3000. The networks use existing twisted pair wiring
in most
environments to provide 100-megabit networking. Clustered systems and
interoperability
between 3000s for database and Web access are two target areas for the
products. A card
to be installed in the 3000 along with driver software -- another part of
MPE/iX 5.5
Express 3 -- enables customers to get at the new bandwidth.