News release

Compaq Announces Major Enhancements to Tru64 UNIX; Ships AlphaServer Systems with Industry's First 64-Bit, 1 GHz Processor

Compaq Computer Corporation (NYSE: CPQ) today introduced major enhancements to its Tru64™ UNIX enterprise operating system and, continuing its ten-year leadership in 64-bit computing, announced that its high-end AlphaServer™ GS Series systems have begun shipping with the industry's first 1 GHz, 64-bit processor.

With new Tru64 UNIX capabilities, Compaq continues to enhance its operating environment, adding powerful workload management, increasing transaction availability with support for online add-and-replacement of processors, lowering the entry cost of proven clusters technology by supporting industry-standard cluster interconnects, and becoming the first company to offer customers the ability to mix 64-bit CPU speeds within a single system.

Support for mixing processor speeds in a single system provides customers with both investment protection and an easy and less expensive upgrade path as they add more powerful CPUs to existing systems.

In addition to announcing that its AlphaServer GS Series systems have begun shipping with the 1 GHz, 64-bit Alpha processor, Compaq also said that its low-end AlphaServer DS Series systems would now be available with an 833 MHz, 64-bit Alpha processor. The AlphaServer GS Series systems support Tru64 UNIX and/or the company's OpenVMS™ operating system. The AlphaServer DS Series systems also support Linux and a Linux ADK (Advanced Developers Kit) is available for the GS Series systems.

"With our announcements today, Compaq has reinforced its leadership in providing high-performance, high-availability solutions to meet the data-intensive computing needs of our customers in fields ranging from e-business to telecommunications to high-performance technical computing," said Rich Marcello, vice president and general manager of Compaq's High Performance Systems Division.

"At the same time, we are building on our growing momentum in the enterprise UNIX marketplace where we have seen revenues increase for eight consecutive quarters," said Marcello.

In addition, leveraging its position as Oracle's lead development partner for Oracle9i Real Applications Clusters (RAC), Compaq also introduced new lower-cost certified Tru64 UNIX-based AlphaServer configurations and an industry-unique "9 Days Program," through which Compaq provides customers with a commitment to a running configuration within nine days of receipt of order.

Tru64 UNIX Enhancements

The enhancements to Compaq's Tru64 UNIX operating environment include:

• More flexible and powerful workload management capabilities for system managers, including Aurema's ARMTech technology that enables dynamic allocation of resources. Compaq's Tru64 UNIX resource management software enables system managers to meet service level agreements with in-house and external clients, even with unpredictable workloads and ever-changing resources.
• The ability to mix 64-bit CPU speeds in AlphaServer GS Series systems and within system partitions. Compaq is the first server vendor to offer this capability that allows system administrators to make optimal price/performance decisions in adding computing resources over time—flexibility that translates into increased investment protection. This capability also applies to AlphaServer systems running OpenVMS.
• Support that allows online add and replacement (OLAR) of CPUs in the AlphaServer GS Series systems without having to interrupt applications and data transactions.
• Support for the industry-standard LAN-based cluster interconnect. This will reduce the entry price for clustered Tru64 UNIX systems, dramatically expanding the number of clients who are ready to adopt Tru64 UNIX clusters for their well-documented manageability and availability features.
• Extended Internet capabilities including Internet Express V5.6 [formerly Open Source Internet Solutions (OSIS)], a collection of open source and commercial software that provides basic infrastructure solutions. In addition, iPlanet Directory Server is now included in Tru64 UNIX, extending directory services to 200,000 users.

AlphaServer Performance Upgrade

The 1 GHz Alpha processor is available now with all AlphaServer GS Series models, the eight-processor GS80, the 16-way GS160 and the industry's most powerful system, the GS320, which can support up to 32 processors.

"Today's announcement that we have begun shipping AlphaServer systems with the industry's first 1 GHz, 64-bit processor, underscores the performance leadership Compaq has had for 10 years in 64-bit computing," added Marcello. "This leadership will continue next year as we introduce a new family of AlphaServer systems running on our next generation EV7 Alpha processor and in the future as Alpha microprocessor and compiler technology is added to Intel's Itanium processor family."

The power of the new Alpha processor was demonstrated recently by the outstanding performance of an AlphaServer GS 320 system running Tru64 UNIX and using Oracle's new 9i database, as it established a world record in the industry standard TPC-C benchmark. The AlphaServer system, supported by a 22 TB StorageWorks™ subsystem, processed 230,533 transactions per minute at a cost of $44.62 per transaction.

New Entry Price for Oracle9i RAC Certified Configurations

Building on its joint engineering and marketing program with Oracle, Compaq also announced a new lower cost for a certified configuration that delivers an AlphaServer ES40 Tru64 UNIX cluster solution running Oracle9i RAC. The certified configuration, which is tested and staged by Oracle and Compaq engineers, is priced 42 percent lower than the previous ES40 certified configuration.

Compaq also introduced the "9 Days Program," a focused engineering and distribution program supporting customers' time-to-solution requirements.

"Compared to the 45 days or more that it takes our competitors to get Oracle9i Real Application Clusters running for customers, Compaq commits that the certified configuration will be running Oracle9i RAC within nine days after we receive a customer's order," said Marcello.

Compaq is joined by key partners in its support of Oracle9i RAC. In North America, Arrow/Wyle, Avnet, Pioneer and Total Tec are featured partners in Compaq's "9 Days program." Magirus and Metrologie serve pan-European customers. In addition, software partners delivering key complementary capabilities to the Oracle9i RAC solution are joining the effort.

"BMC software supports the high availability of business-critical applications for customers running on Oracle solutions, including the new Oracle9i database products," said Gene Austin, general manager, Distributed Data Management business unit of BMC Software. "Through our work with Compaq on Oracle9i and Oracle9i Real Application Clusters, we are focused on optimizing performance and efficiency for our customers working with clustered database solutions. Together with Compaq, we are working to ensure the best possible customer experience."

Pricing/Availability

The AlphaServer GS Series systems with the 1 GHz Alpha processor are immediately available. AlphaServer GS80 systems start at under $95,000, AlphaServer GS160 systems under $255,000 and AlphaServer GS320 systems are priced under $565,000.

Prices for the AlphaServer DS Series systems with the 833 MHz Alpha processor start at $15,400. The DS Series systems are also available immediately.

The new enhanced version of Tru64 UNIX will be pre-installed on Tru64 UNIX AlphaServer systems starting in September.

The enhanced TruCluster™ Server software also will be available in September and is priced from $3,000.

About Compaq

Compaq Computer Corporation, a Fortune Global 100 company, is a leading global provider of technology and solutions. Compaq designs, develops, manufactures, and markets hardware, software, solutions, and services, including industry-leading enterprise computing solutions, fault-tolerant business-critical solutions, and communications products, commercial desktop and portable products, and consumer PCs that are sold in more than 200 countries. Information on Compaq and its products and services is available at http://www.compaq.com.