HP Kayak XW With HP Visualize FX6 Graphics Provides Uncontested Application-Performance Leadership.

PALO ALTO, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Oct. 13, 1998--

HP Posts up to 96 Percent Increase in Graphics Performance over

Strongest Products from Intergraph and SGI

Hewlett-Packard Company, the worldwide workstation leader,(1) today announced that its new HP Kayak XW PC Workstation, with Intel's new 450MHz Xeon processor and industry-leading HP VISUALIZE fx6 OpenGL 3-D graphics, outperforms all Windows NT(R) workstation competitors in every industry-standard benchmark.

This comprehensive list of benchmarks includes application-performance measures such as the new APC SolidWorks Benchmark, the new Indy3D Version 3.0 benchmark and the OPC OpenGL benchmarks. The new HP Kayak XW PC Workstation is scheduled to ship later this month.

"The HP VISUALIZE fx6 graphics card is clearly in a league of its own in the Windows NT and Open GL graphics space," said Boris Elisman, worldwide marketing manager for HP Kayak PC Workstations. "This clean sweep in industry-leading benchmark results again reinforces our market and technology leadership in PC workstations."

As shown in the following table, HP delivers uncontested graphics leadership, with a 10 percent to 96 percent increase in performance over the strongest products from Intergraph and SGI. -0-

                 HP              Intergraph  SGI         HP
                 VISUALIZE       Intense 3-D Octane MXE  Performance
                 fx6 (450MHz)(2) Pro 3410 GT (250MHz)(4) vs. closest
                                 (450MHz)(3)             competitor

Application Benchmarks

APC SolidWorks    2.62            2.39        N/A         110 percent
Indy3D MCAD40     33.0            17.6        14.8        188
Indy3D MCAD150    10.7            5.23        5.45        196
Indy3D Animation  21.8            11.7        16.7        131
Indy3D Simulation 31.2            15.4        23.9        130

Graphics Subsystem Benchmarks

OPC AWadvs-01     52.1            31.3        20.1        166 percent
OPC CDRS-03      181.9           138.1       74.1        132

(NOTE:  Please note higher scores are better.)

The APC SolidWorks Benchmark

In July, the SPEC organization (www.spec.org) introduced its new Application Performance Characterization (APC) benchmarks, including the SolidWorks Mechanical Computer-Aided Design (MCAD) application benchmark for Windows NT workstations. Members of the project include HP, Compaq, Intergraph, IBM, SGI and Sun.

On this MCAD application metric, the HP Kayak XW VISUALIZE fx6 leads the industry with an APC SolidWorks score of 2.62 which is 10 percent faster than the closest competitor. The APC results were posted worldwide on www.spec.org/gpc/apc.static on Oct. 8.

The Indy3D Version 3.0 Benchmark

The Indy3D benchmark is an industry-standard, market-driven benchmark being endorsed by an increasing number of vendors, analysts and publications because of its relevance to end users. Indy3D was created by surveying end users and creating application workloads that match what customers do in three graphics fields: MCAD, animation and visual simulation. In the new Indy3D Version 3.0, there are four tests: MCAD40 (low-complexity model), MCAD150 (high-complexity model), animation and simulation. Indy3D also contains an image-quality test to verify the visual quality of the system being tested.

On this application-oriented benchmark, the HP Kayak XW with HP VISUALIZE fx6 graphics beat the Windows NT competition on every Indy3D performance test. The new system is 36 percent to 105 percent faster than Intense 3D Pro 3410 GT, and beat every Windows NT and UNIX(R) system workstation, including SGI's InfiniteReality systems on the Indy3D animation test. The Indy3D results were posted on www.indy3d.com on Aug. 25.

The OPC OpenGL Benchmarks

In contrast to measuring application performance, the OPC benchmarks measure OpenGL graphics rendering performance. The OPC CDRS test is based on an industrial-design application. The other OPC benchmarks include DRV (based on a plant-design application), DX (based on a data-visualization program), AWadvs (models the graphics load of a 3-D animation tool), and Light (based on an advanced visualization and lighting tool).

The HP Kayak XW with HP VISUALIZE fx6 has the distinction of leading in all five of the OPC graphics benchmarks listed above, among Windows NT systems (HP VISUALIZE fx6 is 66 percent faster than Intergraph and SGI on AWadvs). The OPC results were posted worldwide on www.spec.org/gpc/opc.static on Oct. 8.

No. 1 Workstation Vendor in 1997

International Data Corp. (IDC) ranked HP as the leading supplier of workstations worldwide(5) (UNIX system and Microsoft(R) Windows NT-based workstations).

About HP

Hewlett-Packard Company is a leading global provider of computing, Internet and intranet solutions, services, communications products and measurement solutions, all of which are recognized for excellence in quality and support. HP has 127,200 employees and had revenue of $42.9 billion in its 1997 fiscal year.

Information about HP Kayak PC Workstations can be found on the World Wide Web at http://www.hp.com/go/kayak.

(1) Based on the IDC Worldwide Workstation Review and Forecast 1997-2002.

(2) All HP results are on Intel Pentium(R) II Xeon 450Mhz processor. APC results from www.spec.org/gpc/apc.static Web site. OPC results from www.spec.org/gpc/opc.static Web site.

(3) All Intergraph results are on 450 MHz processors. APC results from APC Web site (Intergraph did not submit Xeon processor results). Indy3D numbers measured by HP on 450 MHz Intel Pentium II Xeon processor (Intergraph did not submit results for Indy3D). OPC results from the OPC Web site.

(4) SGI APC SolidWorks not applicable because SolidWorks only runs on Microsoft Windows(R). Indy3D results are measured by HP (SGI did not submit Indy3D results). OPC results are from OPC Web site.

(5) Based on unit shipments.

Note to Editors: Pentium is a U.S. registered trademark and Xeon is a trademark of Intel Corporation.

Microsoft, Windows NT and Windows are U.S. registered trademarks of Microsoft Corporation.

UNIX is a registered trademark of The Open Group.