Hewlett-Packard's new low-cost Model 712 workstation will set a price/performance standard for NEXTSTEP when NeXT's PA-RISC port is finished later this year.
Starting at under $4000 list price, the Model 712 will compete with entry-level offerings from Sun and SGI, and with high-end Intel 486- and Pentium-based computers. The base model will sport 16MB of memory, 260MB of disk, and a 15-inch color monitor for $3995. It is based on a new version of the HP PA-RISC design called the 7100LC, which offers superior performance to competitive RISC and CISC processors, according to HP test results. The company also announced a low-cost server line based on the new chip and outlined future strategy for the PA-RISC chip line.
"We are moving aggressively into the commercial space," said Pierre Bouchard, product marketing manager for HP's workstation group." We are aiming this line at information-systems departments that need shrinkwrapped applications, a rich operating-system environment with network management, and the enterprisewide service and support that HP can provide."
NeXT and HP had the Model 712 in mind as the target platform for NEXTSTEP for PA-RISC as far back as last May, when the two companies announced their partnership, according to a source at NeXT. An alpha version of the PA-RISC port is expected to be shown when HP officially unveils the new systems in mid-January. The product is on track to ship by the middle of this year, as previously announced, the source said.
The new HP low-cost E-Class servers, which begin at less than $5000, are due in the first quarter of 1994. Designed for enterprisewide solutions requiring a large number of distributed servers, the systems are well suited to host NeXT's Portable Distributed Objects for HP servers, a product that began shipping in November.
The new machines promise fast graphics and integer-calculation speed. MPEG decompression built into the silicon displays full-motion video at 30 frames per second. Although the servers and workstations share the same processor, the servers can hold more memory and larger disks, and have more networking and I/O ports.