StepServer, LANStor FileMaster          NetWare file servers
Everex Joins Storage Dimensions for NetWare Server
 
Microbytes Daily News Service
Copyright (c) 1989, McGraw-Hill, Inc.
Everex and Storage Dimensions have codeveloped a network server
that eliminates the bus bottleneck, the companies claim.
 
The Everex StepServer and Storage Dimensions LANStor FileMaster
include a 33-MHz 80386 CPU with a modified (16.5-, 11-, or 8-MHz)
AT bus, three-tiered caching, 32-bit networking adapters, and
SCSI disk caching.
 
The resulting file servers have 2 to 3 times the data throughput
of "PC-as-server" systems, the companies claim.
 
The base systems include a 150-megabyte SCSI hard disk drive, a
1.2-megabyte 5.25-inch floppy disk drive, 4 megabytes of RAM, a
128K-byte RAM cache, a 101-key keyboard, a Hercules driver, and a
12-inch monochrome monitor. The BIOS is a modified AMI design.
 
At maximum configuration, the systems sport 16 megabytes of RAM,
an internal storage capacity of 1.3 gigabytes, and an external
storage capacity of more than 18 gigabytes, thanks to the SCSI
daisy-chain and 1.2-gigabyte drives from Storage Dimensions.
 
In terms of caching, the 128K bytes of RAM cache is optimized for
Novell's disk caching algorithm, the companies claim. In
addition, there's a scalable CPU cache of 256K bytes and a
read-ahead caching scheme on the SCSI peripherals of at least one
track (64K bytes on a 38-megabyte drive, for example).
 
Price: $11,599.
 
Contacts:
 
Everex Computer Systems Division, 48504 Kato Rd., Fremont, CA
94538, (800) 356-4283.
 
Storage Dimensions, 2145 Hamilton Ave., San Jose, CA 95125, (408)
879-0300.
 
                              --- Roger K. Adams
 
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