Corollary Inc’s interprocessor 32-bit C-bus and symmetric multiprocessing Unix kernel is becoming to builders of multiple iAPX-86-based machines what Phoenix Technologies Inc’s BIOS is to MS-DOS personal computer builders, and the latest to bite is Irvine, California-based Advanced Logic Research Inc, which showed a six-processor 80486-based machine, the MultiAccess Series 3000 systems, which comes in a tower or minicomputer-type box. The machine, reports Microbytes, is designed to use the MPX multi-processor version of Santa Cruz Operation Inc’s Unix System V, and with planned multiprocessing versions of NetWare and OS/2. Its 13 bus slots all have connectors for both the C-bus and for the standard 16-bit AT bus. Processor boards – each with one or two 25MHz or 33MHz 80486s with 8Kb external cache, expandable to 256Kb per board, and maths co-processor – plug into both buses, one at either end, and peripheral boards can be plugged into the AT bus. The tower-style box has five storage bays, the mini-type box has 12. All come with a 5.25 floppy and 330Mb or 650Mb caching SCSI drives, an 800 by 600 VGA graphics board, nine serial ports expandable to 64, and parallel port. With one 25MHz CPU, 8Mb and 330Mb disk, it is $16,000, with two CPUs and the bigger disk it costs $27,000, and processor boards are $6,000 for 25MHz and $7,500 for 33MHz; a copy of MPX, at $1,000, is needed for each CPU and Santa Cruz Unix System V.3.2 is $900; ships are set for the fourth quarter.
