IBM has announced the next generation of OS/2 Warp, version 5, will be rolling
out early next year. One of the key ingredients is the SMP (Symmetric Multiprocessing)
feature. Why is this such good news?
For one thing, SMP the OS/2 way will mean 64-way SMP support. While Microsoft
and others struggle with 4-way and perhaps someday 8-way SMP, OS/2 version 5 will
support up to 64 Pentium CPUs in a single PC. Furthermore, IBM's way of scaling
SMP is inherently superior to products like NT, because IBM's stated design goal
is 100% utilization of each additional processor in an SMP CPU bed. That is one
reason why Warp Server Advanced blows the doors off of NT Advanced Server -- IBM's
implementation of 4-way SMP is essentially 1 full CPU better than Microsoft's.
In other words, the fourth Pentium for NTAS is unavailable, while IBM's best server
utilizes 60% of its capacity.
Well, that's all well and good, but you may be thinking that 64 Pentiums is
a little out of your price range. Think again. Moore's Law implies that in two
or three years, Pentiums at the 200 MHz level will be a dime a dozen. A nice 8x8
matrix of Socket 7's will actually be feasible. But there's one more reason that
surpasses even these: the issue of scalability versus data handling.
Having a single CPU or even 4-way PC max out means trouble, because now you've
got to network several of these boxes together, plus find network management tools
and additional storage space for a growing "server farm." Your data must
now be partitioned across multiple hard drives located in several different physical
machines. This is a headache to manage and an absolute migraine to troubleshoot.
Meanwhile, your OS/2 Warp 5 machine running 4 CPUs cannot "max out";
you simply pop another 4 CPUs in the box and keep right on working. Need more server
power, throughput, and thread-handling? Drop another 8, 24, or 56 CPUs into the
box. No server farm, no need for distributed data management across multiple hard
drives, and no low-bandwidth NIC bottlenecks in between them -- no more headaches
for a long, long time.
This indeed GREAT news for network administrators! The only question now is.....
Where's the hype???
Tom Nadeau
VOICE Marketing Director -- http://www.os2voice.org
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