Amdahl Successfully Completes Multi-Terabyte Simulation for Data Warehouse Solutions; Oracle Certified Test Confirms Amdahl Capability to Deliver Cost-Effective Solutions for Managing the Demands of Large Scale Environments

Business Wire, May 22, 1996

SUNNYVALE, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--May 22, 1996--Amdahl Corporation, an enterprise computing company, today announced the successful completion of the Oracle(R) "Test-to-Scale" certification program designed to validate vendor capability to deliver an integrated multi-terabyte data warehouse solution. Completion of the simulation demonstrates Amdahl expertise in designing, implementing and managing multi-terabyte Oracle databases, using Amdahl RAID 5 storage, processors and software offerings. With this certification, Amdahl joins the ranks of a select few vendors who have successfully completed the program.

In conjunction with Data General's CLARiiON Business Unit and Cray Research, the Oracle "Test-to-Scale" simulation recreated the data warehousing requirements of a worldwide shipping organization. The simulated organization was comprised of 25 offices with 200 million customer invoices, consisting of over six billion line items. In paper form, the data would fill over 40,000 four-drawer filing cabinets. The scale of the simulation was 200 times larger than a typical LAN environment and much larger than most environments of Global 1000 customers.

"The successful completion of the certification program is important for two reasons," said Charles Foley, Amdahl vice president for open systems storage. "First, many of our large corporate customers are deploying massive databases in support of critical business decision systems. Amdahl has successfully validated the use of RAID 5 as a cost-effective solution for these massive databases. In addition, the project reaffirms our expertise in designing and implementing very large data warehouse solutions for our customers, combining RAID 5 data protection with scalable open systems platforms."

The simulation used over three terabytes of RAID 5 disk storage, integrating 38 Amdahl Series 3000 Disk Arrays, with a 64-way Amdahl SPARC Summit 6400E server running the Oracle Universal Database(TM). The Series 3000 Disk Array, produced by Amdahl with CLARiiON, was chosen for its high data availability and high-performance storage architecture, key requirements in data warehouse implementations. The Series 3000 uses RAID 5 data protection coupled with fully redundant storage processors, power supplies, fans and mirrored non-volatile cache.

In most business-critical data warehouses, companies cannot afford a loss of data availability because of a component failure. Use of the Series 3000 in this simulation demonstrates that the creation and execution of a critical database can be protected from interruption due to a storage system failure. During the certification, over one terabyte of data was loaded and queries were executed in record time, even while disk failure tests were introduced into the storage system. At no time did a disk failure disrupt data loading or access, which validates the high availability architecture of the Series 3000.

The AS6400E server is one of a family of SPARC based servers supplied by Amdahl Corporation. "The 6400E was chosen because of its 64-way multi-processing capabilities. This meets the high-performance and configuration requirements of today's data warehousing environment," stated Jim Hilbert, vice president of server marketing, open enterprise solutions. "The proprietary backbone interconnect allows full linear scalability while adding processors, and the robust architecture and high-availability design also provides protection against disruption."

The Oracle Universal Database is the foundation for data warehousing applications. It uses sophisticated optimization, joining and indexing techniques to quickly and easily create large databases. As an industry leader, the Oracle solution is frequently chosen to handle multi-terabyte data warehousing systems.

Amdahl will release a series of white papers discussing the design, creation and testing of the certified simulation project implemented for the Oracle Test-to-Scale program. The white papers will be available in late June from Amdahl sales representatives and on the Amdahl home pages on the Internet.

Amdahl Corporation (AMEX:AMH) provides integrated enterprise computing solutions designed to meet the needs of the leading, most compute-intensive corporations around the world. Amdahl combines proprietary hardware and software products and service methods with best of breed offerings to create customized solutions that help clients gain a competitive advantage in their industries. -0-

Note to Editors: Amdahl is a registered trademark of Amdahl Corporation. SPARC is a registered trademark of SPARC International, Inc. Oracle is a registered trademark and Oracle Universal Database is a trademark of Oracle Corporation. All other trademarks are property of their respective holders.

CONTACT: Amdahl Corporation

Pattie Davis, 408/746-6158

pattie.davis@amail.amdahl.com

or

The Benjamin Group, Inc.

Traci Calderon, 408/559-6090

tcalder@sv.tbgi.com