HP Launches 64-Bit PA-8000 Enterprise Servers; Ushers in Unprecedented Era of Computing Power, Price/Performance and Internet Performance.

PALO ALTO, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Sept. 16, 1996--Extending its leadership in high-performance UNIX(R) system enterprise computing, Hewlett-Packard Company today introduced a broad range of new HP 9000 enterprise servers running on the world's fastest and most powerful RISC processor shipping today, the HP PA-8000(1). These computers define new standards in transaction and Internet performance for everything from entry-level workgroup servers to mainframe-class systems -- incorporating 64-bit processing and providing a growth path into the higher-performance environments of the next century.

The best of the new PA-8000-based family of servers is the HP 9000 K-Class, which recently shattered previous records for TPC-C benchmarks in a midrange system, with 12,321 transactions-per-minute (tpmC) at $187 per tpmC.(2) This outstanding result was achieved through an advanced-technology relationship with Sybase and its Sybase SQL Server 11 database platform. The HP 9000 D-Class servers also redefine entry-level performance with the industry's best RISC entry-level performance results of 5,822 tpmC at $148 per tpmC.

The HP 9000 D-Class servers also redefine entry-level performance, with the industry's best RISC entry-level performance results of 5,822 tpmC at $157 per tpmC.

HP 9000 enterprise servers demonstrated superior Internet performance with recent SPECweb benchmarks, which established the K-Class system as the fastest Internet processor in the computer industry with 801 SPECweb operations per second in a uniprocessor configuration. HP believes they could achieve as many as 2,000 Web operations/s in a four-way configuration.

The HP 9000 K460 offers unmatched midrange file-serving performance as measured by the SPEC LADDIS benchmark of 9,572 operations/s at a 19.9-millisecond response time.

In application benchmarks running SAP R/3 Release 3.0 D with Oracle 7.3 database system, the HP 9000 Model K460 supported 1,400 Sales and Distribution benchmark users with an average dialog response time of 1.55 seconds.(3) These performance leaps provide customers with a new era of choice in entry-level and midrange UNIX system servers to support growing application requirements.

For high-end transaction processing, HP also announced the HP 9000 T-Class Model 600 (T600) system, which supports up to 12 64-bit PA-8000 CPUs. T-Class systems, with cost-effective data-center-class performance and extensive growth capabilities, are an ideal alternative to proprietary mainframe systems.

HP also announced PA-8000 support for the high-end HP 9000 Enterprise Parallel Servers (EPS). The Enterprise Parallel Server architecture combines the strengths of massively parallel processing and symmetric multiprocessing (SMP) technologies for ultra-high-end scalability and investment protection for such applications as large-scale decision support and data warehousing.

"HP has been a major provider of open-systems technology to Wells Fargo Bank for several years," said Barry X Lynn, executive vice president of Wells Fargo's Customer Information Group. "The introduction of HP's new 64-bit technology on the PA-8000 is very exciting to us because of its high potential for very fast transaction-processing and decision-support functionality."

DRIVEN BY 64-BIT PA-8000 POWER

HP's PA-8000 microprocessor has achieved SPEC95 ratings of 11.8 SPECint95 and 20.2 SPECfp95. For compute-intensive tasks, the PA-8000 20.2 SPECfp95 rating is more than 40 percent faster than the nearest competitor in its class. Advanced optimizing compilers and "intelligent execution" allow the PA-8000 to attain superscalar performance levels unmatched by other vendors.

"The strength and commercial and technical performance of the new PA-8000 technology reaffirm HP's commitment to maintaining product leadership in the market for enterprise servers," said Richard C. Watts, HP vice president and general manager of the Computer Systems Organization. "At the enterprise level, HP's ability to deliver powerful and innovative solutions such as the PA-8000 server family differentiates HP as a strategic IT partner. No other RISC-server vendor approaches HP in performance, value proposition or investment protection. And the best news for our customers is that this is just the first step toward new frontiers of performance."

K-CLASS BLAZES NEW COMPUTING TRAIL

HP today introduced four new servers in its K-Class family of enterprise servers -- Models K250, K260, K450 and the record-breaking K460, which has shattered previous audited midrange system transaction-per-minute benchmarks with 12,321 tpmC at $187 per tpmC. In the midrange-systems arena, the K460 offers the following: -0-

-- twice the performance of IBM's RS/6000 J40;

-- 65 percent better performance than Digital Equipment

Corporation's 4100 5/400; and

-- 85 percent better performance than Sun Microsystem's

Ultra Enterprise 3000. -0-

With these levels of performance, HP's K-Class offers better performance than other vendors' high-end servers:

-- K-Class midrange is 7 percent better-performing than

Sun's high-end UE 5000, which has been audited at

11,465 tpmC at $191 per tpmC.

-- K-Class is more than 65 percent faster than Digital's

high-end Model 8200.

HP 9000 K-Class servers are used primarily as application, Internet, database, LAN and Network File System and compute-intensive servers. The sheer power of the PA-8000-based HP K-Class means that large-scale databases, Web and Internet solutions now can be accommodated on midrange platforms -- giving customers unprecedented price/performance advantages for this range of performance.

The four new HP 9000 K-Class systems are designed for symmetric multiprocessing and can each accommodate from one to four PA-8000 processors, giving customers unbeatable 'in-box' scalability and easy on-site performance upgrades when additional performance is needed. The K250 and K260 support up to 2GB of memory, four HP-PB slots, one high-speed HP-HSC I/O slot and up to 3.8TB of disk storage. The K450 and K460 support up to 4GB of physical memory, eight HP-PB slots, five HP-HSC slots and up to 8.3TB of disk storage. All systems run the recently announced HP-UX(4) 10.20 enterprise-class operating system, and all existing K-Class server models are upgradeable to the PA-8000 processor models and beyond.

U.S. PRICE AND AVAILABILITY

The PA-8000-based HP 9000 K-Class servers are available immediately at the following starting prices:

-- $52,200 for the Model K250;

-- $61,200 for the Model K260;

-- $68,200 for the Model K450; and

-- $77,200 for the Model K460.

D-CLASS REDEFINES ENTRY LEVEL

The new, aggressively priced entry-level HP 9000 D-Class range has been enhanced even further with two new models running the PA-8000 chip set -- the D270 and D370 -- that are scalable for one- and two-way SMP processing.

In addition to such standard server roles as workgroup servers, departmental servers and replicated applications sites, HP 9000 D-Class enterprise servers function primarily as Internet or Web servers and perform Network File System-type applications. The D-Class family of servers is designed for resellers. Some system integration of the D-Class servers is done at partner sites; this allows partners to stock a variety of chassis and CPUs to minimize inventory-carrying costs and still meet customers' expectations for quick delivery.

The Model D270 and D370 systems can each support up to 1.5GB of memory and up to 5TB of disk storage. The Model D370 comes with a Fast/Wide SCSI card; a Remote Management Interface card; and a hot-pluggable disk, which improves system availability and reliability. Both systems run the recently announced HP-UX 10.20 enterprise-class operating system, and all existing D-Class server models are upgradeable to the 64-bit PA-8000 processor and beyond.

U.S. PRICING AND AVAILABILITY

Starting prices for the two new PA-8000-based HP 9000 D-Class servers are $22,260 for the D270 and $25,250 for the D370. Both servers are scheduled to be orderable starting in October.

T-CLASS IS THE MAINFRAME ALTERNATIVE

At the high-end of the HP 9000 Server Family, HP announced a new PA-8000-based T-Class system -- the Model T600 -- which supports up to 12-way SMP processing and offers customers a cost-effective, mainframe-alternative platform. Featuring a service processor, the T-Class Enterprise Servers are designed to be highly manageable on-line transaction-processing and decision-support servers. The vast number of proprietary software applications ported to this open platform is testament to its unmatched success as a mainframe-alternative solution.

The Model T600 supports up to 3.75GB of memory, with future growth of up to 16GB; a combination of up to 168 HP-PB or up to 24 high-speed HSC slots; and up to 30TB of disk storage. Existing HP 9000 Model T520 customers may upgrade to the Model T600 via on-site, in-cabinet board swap, and additional PA-8000 CPUs can be added as required.

U.S. AVAILABILITY

The new PA-8000-based HP 9000 Model T600 server is scheduled to be available in the second calendar quarter of 1997.

LEADING THE WAY TO 64-BIT COMPUTING

HP's robust, standards-based UNIX operating-system environment, HP-UX, is the industry's leading enterprise-class UNIX operating system. In February 1996, HP-UX became the first UNIX operating system to be certified compliant with the single UNIX system specification, X/Open UNIX 95. In its latest iteration, released on Aug. 1, HP-UX Version 10.20 includes new features such as support for the PA-8000 microprocessor, 64-bit integer register calculation, an increase in file size from 4GB to 128GB.

HP also announced plans to evolve to a full 64-bit version of HP-UX, with an expected release of mid-1997, and to provide customers with the smoothest, cleanest transition to maximize performance gains. Current and future 32-bit applications are expected to be able to run alongside or interoperate with 64-bit applications within the HP-UX environment, and 32-bit applications are expected to execute in the 64-bit environment without recompilation.

HP and Santa Cruz Operations are presently developing a version of this next-generation UNIX system technology, which is expected to be licensed by both companies starting in 1998. Customers can expect full binary compatibility with future systems -- including those based on the co-developed HP and Intel microprocessor.

STORAGE PORTFOLIO STRENGTHENS TOTAL SOLUTION

Continuing its commitment to provide best-in-class storage solutions that are fully integrated and performance-optimized for use with HP 9000 Enterprise Servers, HP also unveiled a host of enhancements to its on-line and off-line storage portfolio.

The new SP620 controller enables high-availability functionality with HP's Model 20 high-availability disk array while improving performance more than 60 percent. As a result, HP's entire on-line storage offering -- HP's disk array with AutoRAID, HP's high-availability disk array Model 20 and HP/EMC's Symmetrix 3000 -- provide superior performance to meet the business needs of HP 9000 customers from the desktop to the datacenter.

HP's new desktop DLT4000 tape drive provides the same leading performance, capacity and reliability of HP's recently introduced Advanced DLT library systems in a much smaller footprint. This tape drive, which is supported on both HP 9000 enterprise servers and workstations, is ideal for desktop and workgroup backup-recovery, archiving or HSM applications requiring robustness for unattended operation and high performance. HP's newest addition to its DLT4000-based tape offering is fully integrated with HP OpenView OmniBack II and OmniStorage as well as a broad range of leading third-party storage-management solutions.

For data-center customers already using StorageTek's Automated Cartridge Systems for ultra-high-performance and ultra-high-capacity backup-recovery jobs, HP-UX now supports StorageTek's newest "silo" technology, the Redwood SD-3 Tape Cartridge Subsystem. Supported with HP 9000 T-Class enterprise servers and Enterprise Parallel Servers based on T-Class nodes (EPS 30 and 31), the Redwood SD-3 Tape Cartridge Subsystems enable fast, reliable backup of hundreds of terabytes using HP OpenView OmniBack II.

HP PROFESSIONAL SERVICES 

HP provides a range of flexible services to address support needs for businesses that cannot tolerate prolonged system downtime. Customers needing continuous availability of their critical business applications choose HP Business Continuity Support. This service provides a thorough, proactive approach that stresses problem prevention and overall minimization of system downtime. Customers looking for rapid response times and assistance to their in-house IT departments in establishing preventive support measures choose HP's Personalized System Support. This fall, HP plans to roll out new services to address additional critical business environments.

HP also provides information-technology consulting to assist in the planning, design and implementation of IT architectures that support mission-critical applications. Available HP professional services include consulting for Internet/intranet solutions, security evaluation and solution design, data warehousing, network and systems management and enterprise messaging. Comprehensive training in all of these areas and for UNIX system technology also is available.

ABOUT HP

HP 9000 servers, based on HP's industry-leading HP-UX enterprise-class operating environment and PA-RISC technology, provide the high-performance and systems-management capabilities required by data-center environments, as well as the flexibility and performance necessary for client/server implementations. HP is the industry leader in providing complete commercial UNIX system business solutions to customers in a broad range of industries.

Hewlett-Packard Company is a leading global manufacturer of computing, communications and measurement products and services recognized for excellence in quality and support. HP has 110,800 employees and had revenue of $31.5 billion in its 1995 fiscal year.

Information about HP and its products can be found on the World Wide Web at http://www.hp.com.

(1) PA-RISC stands for Precision Architecture-reduced-instruction- set computing.

(2) tpmC is a standard unit of measurement used by the Transaction Processing Council in its industry-standard database system benchmarks.

(3) The SAP benchmark, conducted at Hewlett-Packard Company in Cupertino, Calif., achieved a throughput of 436,000 dialog steps-per-hour with an average CPU utilization of 80 percent for the 16 HP 9000 K420 4-way application servers. The servers ran HP-UX 10.10 with 2GB of memory. The CPU utilization of the HP 9000 K460 four-way database server was 99 percent. The server was configured with 2GB of memory and ran HP-UX 10.20. The disk storage of 392GB for the benchmark was provided by HP AutoRAID disk arrays. This benchmark fully complies with SAP's issued benchmark regulations and has been audited and certified by SAP. Further technical details may be obtained from HP or SAP AG.

(4) HP-UX 9.X and 10.0 for HP 9000 Series 700 and 800 computers are X/Open(tm) Company UNIX(R) 93 branded products. HP-UX 10.20 is an X/Open UNIX 95 branded product. -0-

Note to Editors: X/Open is a trademark of X/Open Company Limited in the UK and other countries.

UNIX is a registered trademark in the United States and other countries, licensed exclusively through X/Open Company Limited.

CONTACT: Hewlett Packard Company

Bob Major, 408/447-1673

e-mail: [e-mail]