Perhaps the most important part of Sequent’s game plan is news that its promised Scalable Data Interconnect for enabling database queries to be processed across as many as a 120 Pentiums distributed on up to four clustered symmetric multiprocessing systems, will begin to ship in September. Scalable Data Interconnect, SDI will be used in conjunction with a new 1.3 release of ptx/Clusters software. Sequent describes Scalable Data Interconnect as a direct memory-to-memory, or node-to-node, communication pipeline enabling co-operating applications – such as those using the optimised Oracle7 release – to use all of the processing power of processors in a cluster to handle database queries. Each Scalable Data Interconnect link will have up to five 40Mbps connections. All current Sequent systems will support Scalable Data Interconnect, which has evolved out of joint development work Sequent and Oracle have been doing on Oracle Parallel Server since September 1993. Sequent says the Interconnect removes the requirement for proprietary or exotic massively parallel processing solutions. Scalable Data Interconnect hardware and software includes an input-output controller, firmware and cluster software. Pricing for ptx/SDI isn’t given, but to use it customers will require the optimised Oracle7, to be available later this year, the new $25,000 input-output controller, Dynix/ptx 4.1 and the $50,000 ptx/Clusters 1.3.
