Alpha NT News, June 1998

June 1998

Week ending 26 June, 1998

Compaq -- Stabilized Alpha Is Best For High-End Apps

Compaq is set to provide solutions for customers with the classic lineup of x86/NT on the low-end, Alpha NT in the midrange, and Alpha and UNIX on the high-end.

Samsung taps Chin to head Alpha unit

A look at API, plus some of their plans (like doing $100M in sales the first year!)

Direct Sales strategies -- Compaq Defines Channel Moves

A good-news/bad-news article for OEMs -- you can sell Alpha now, but you may have to compete against Compaq...

Compaq Claims Victory Over Plague Of Inventory -- News comes just in time for merger with Digital

More of the same from Compaq, with good words about Alpha and how they'll be making it an industry standard.

VERITAS Enters Distribution Agreement with St. Bernard Software to Deliver Open File Storage Management for Windows NT Enterprises

The two companies integrate their wares to provide better file and storage management.

Microsoft lighting up huge Web site with SQL Server 7.0 back end

Take a look at the planet from a whole new perspective -- namely, low-earth orbit! Think of someplace you'd like to go, click on a map or enter the name, and get whisked there in seconds. While the database is not fully populated yet, it sure is fun to be able to view landmarks (like Fort Morgan, near Mobile, or the Statue of Liberty in New York, or the Magic Kingdom at DisneyWorld!) Populated with over 1 TB of SQL Server 7.0 database and 3.5 TB of imagery, this is an example of a VLM (Very Large Memory -- i.e., 64 bit) application at its best! Visit the TerraServer based on an AlphaServer 8400 at http://www.terraserver.com/.

DEC and ENCOM Coupe

Remember the movie "Tron"? And the arcade game "Discs of Tron" that it spawned? This update that is being developed on and runs on Windows NT on Alpha is targetted initially for the arcade, but may make it to the desktop and game machines in the future. That is, when there's enough horsepower in game machines to handle it. The MPEG demo file is worth the download if you're into games -- this is supposedly a screen capture from an actual prototype game running, although the final will "be significantly better". As if it's not good enough already...

Week ending 19 June, 1998

[Note: to expedite creating the large number of links to these items, this week I've put all my commentary in the article, "Alpha Rocks!" available on this site's homepage. -- Aaron]

Week ending 12 June, 1998

Birth of a giant

Compaq's Work Is Just Starting -- Digital integration to result in loss of jobs

Alpha Gets Vote Of Confidence From Compaq

Compaq pledges volume Alpha sales

Compaq unveils post-merger plans, more job cuts

Pfeiffer outlines Compaq's envelopment of Digital

Pfeiffer sets forth Compaq's new course

Compaq executive- Alpha central to 64-bit plans

Digital's Palmer: A checkered legacy

Digital Brand Name Will Disappear

After 40 years in existence, Digital disappears. As it goes, the ashes of the old strengthen its successor, bringing it to Digital's old number 2 spot in the computer industry. With the integration come more good words for Alpha than we've heard from any Digital management in the past 6 years, with Eckhard Pfeiffer and his VP's making memorable quotes such as:

"Compaq will support leadership in 64-bit computing by moving Alpha ... into volume platforms," -- Eckhard Pfeiffer, CEO, Compaq

"Our leadership in 64-bit computing is critical for us," -- Eckhard Pfeiffer

"Alpha provides us with a good five-year head start on 64-bit computing... We will drive Alpha to be part of an open industry standard for 64-bit computing. And it's worth noting that Microsoft uses Alpha as the development platform for Windows NT." -- John Rose, General Manager, Enterprise Computing Group

"With Merced it's been one delay after another. So we feel we can lead with Alpha." -- John Rando, General Manager, Compaq Services

"If Merced comes along and offers differentiation, we can migrate the Alpha platforms, but with the delays, I wonder how long people will give credibility to Merced." -- John Rando

With friends like these, it will be harder and harder to make excuses not to buy Alpha!

New Samsung subsidiary to promote Alpha

Expect an announcement at 4:30 PM Tuesday, June 16, regarding the formation of this company with the remarkably simple and straightforward name "Alpha Processor, Inc.".

Compaq to Leverage NT in Digital Deal

Compaq is working with Microsoft to shoot for the glass house, integrating applications enablers ACMSxp and Reliable Transaction Router (RTR) with Microsoft's Transaction Server (MTS) in a shot at the high-end performance and reliability characteristics common to OpenVMS and UNIX systems.

Merced delay does matter, but be flexible

FTC antitrust fallout mushrooms around Intel

Intel stumbles and analysts start looking for alternatives. Fortunately for them, they don't have to look far to find a better option.

The odd couple -- Despite differences, Windows NT and Unix still have to live under one roof

An interesting look at how some people are integrating NT and UNIX, with perspectives quite varied, ranging from "Love-Hate" to "Hate-Love" and even the middle-ground "Love-Love"!

TelnetD: Thin-client access to text apps

Nowadays, "character cell terminal access" is known by its politically correct name "thin-client text applications". Here's a newbie to the game with a nicely flushed out entry with competitive pricing.

DIGITAL and Alternate Realities Introduce VisionDome for Alpha Windows NT

A full-immersion virtual reality environment, something akin to an IMAX dome, but completely computer generated. If you've got the money, you too can immerse viewers in the VisionDome.

PC Magazine- First Looks Online -- Internet Explorer 5.0 Developer Preview
Internet Explorer 5.0 Developer Preview Download

The new developer beta is reviewed by PC Magazine; the second link is a pointer to the download site. Alpha bits are indeed available, making this the first beta of IE to be sim-released to consumers by Microsoft. Not surprising considering the minimum requirements for "Chrome" are pretty hard for an Intel system to match.

Dialogic and Digital Equipment Corporation Partner to Deliver Computer Telephony Servers

Using Digital's PICMG standard DMCC boards, a complete CT environment is being built on NT.

Excalibur Announces Excalibur RetrievalWare 6

Excalibur has a new version of their "knowledge retrieval" engine.

Oracle readies Rdb database for Windows NT (InfoWorld)

And here comes Rdb for NT. Finally.

Back to Top

The Alpha NT Source

Last revised Saturday, 29 April 2000

AlphaMan

Compaq, Digital, Alpha, and Alphapowered are trademarks of Compaq Computer Corporation.
Windows NT is a trademark of Microsoft.

The AlphaNT Source website and its contents Copyright � 1998,1999,2000 by Aaron C. Sakovich
unless otherwise indicated.

This site is free documentation; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or (at your option) any later version. This document is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License for more details.

You should be able to access a copy of the GNU General Public License on this website; if not, write to the Free SoftwareFoundation, Inc., 59 Temple Place - Suite 330, Boston, MA 02111-1307, USA.

News & announcements

June 1998

Back to Top