SIZZLING DIGITAL WORKSTATION SCREAMS BY THE COMPETITION

Sets Industry Benchmark Records; Offers 50-150% Higher Application
Performance Than HP, SGI, and Sun...

Complemented by First 64-Bit UNIX Workstation Priced Under $5K..

New Technical Solutions Initiative Focuses on Key Markets...

MAYNARD, Mass., July 14, 1995 -- Digital Equipment Corporation today
accelerated its assault on the workstation market by launching two systems
which shatter all major workstation performance records. The AlphaStation
600 family, with blazing speed and sporting new 3D graphics options and
multimedia enhancements, offers customers unparalleled performance for the
most-demanding technical applications. Prices for complete systems start
at $29,300.

Digital also announced new, lower-cost configurations of its entry-level,
AlphaStation 200 family, including the first 64-bit UNIX workstation
priced under $5,000. With these pricing moves, Digital's entire
workstation line now boasts the best performance and leadership
price/performance across the entire $5,000-to-$50,000 spectrum of the
volume workstation market.

The AlphaStation 600 Models 5/300 and 5/266 are powered by Digital's Alpha
21164 RISC microprocessor, the industry's first to process more than one
billion instructions per second. This raw power is complemented by a new
high-performance system architecture designed to maximize performance in
such power-hungry applications as mechanical design, electronic design,
and geographic mapping and modeling. The Model 600 5/300 is the first
uniprocessor workstation to break the 300 SPECint92 and 500 SPECfp92
barriers, and the first to achieve a record-breaking AIM benchmark of
639.6 Jobs/Minute.

Outdistancing the Competition

Philippe Ribeyre, vice president, Workstation Business Segment, said
AlphaStation 600 performance puts Digital a year ahead of major
competitors. "Digital's commanding lead in RISC microprocessors,
high-performance system design, and 64-bit operating systems enables us to
deliver unmatched application performance in real customer environments.
While our competitors' 32-bit architectures are on their last legs,
Digital's customers can take advantage of our second-generation
high-performance 64-bit architecture for dramatic application performance
benefits today."

Ribeyre offered the following application performance data to prove his
point. Across a series of application benchmarks from well-known
companies, including Parametric Technologies, EDS Unigraphics, Synopsys,
and Mentor Graphics, the AlphaStation 600 5/266 system outperformed an HP
Series 9000 Model 735/125 by an average of 65 percent. Similar benchmarks
run against a Sun SPARCstation 20/61 and 20/71 show the AlphaStation 600
Model 5/266 enjoys a performance advantage of more than 150 percent and
100 percent, respectively.

The AlphaStation 600 5/266 system delivers compute performance of 288
SPECint92 and 428 SPECfp92. The AlphaStation 600 5/300 system is rated at
334 SPECint92 and 503 SPECfp92. It also delivers audited AIM VI peak
performance of 639.6 Jobs/Minute and a sustained performance of 580.1
Loads.

The AlphaStation 600 Model 5/266, when compared to the new J200 workstation
from Hewlett-Packard, provides 71 percent higher SPECint92 performance and
59 percent higher SPECfp performance, at a lower entry price.

Unprecedented Technical Computing Solution

"These record-shattering AlphaStation systems, combined with the
revolutionary AlphaServer 8200 and 8400 systems, offer an unprecedented
technical computing solution for the individual user, the department, and
the enterprise," commented Michael Gallup, vice president of Worldwide
Marketing, Systems Business Unit. "We're fully leveraging this competitive
advantage by investing our marketing resources in close concert with our
software partners and resellers, to promote the uniqueness of Digital's
technical client/server product lineup," he added.

Pricing and Availability

The Model 600 5/266, available immediately, is priced at $31,800 for a
complete system including 32MB of ECC RAM, 2MB of cache, a 1GB hard drive,
17-inch color monitor, quad-speed CD-ROM, 3.5-inch floppy drive, ZLXp-E1
graphics, floppy disk, audio card, headset, microphone, keyboard mouse,
power cord, and a choice of Digital UNIX or OpenVMS operating systems. A
similarly configured system running the Windows NT operating system and
priced at $29,300 will be available in the fourth quarter of this calendar
year.

The AlphaStation Model 600 5/300 similarly configured but with 64MB of ECC
RAM, 4MB of cache, 21-inch monitor, and Digital UNIX operating system is
priced at $44,995. It will be available in the fourth quarter of this
calendar year. All AlphaStation 600 5/300 systems are available with
Digital UNIX, OpenVMS, or Windows NT operating systems. The new
workstations carry an industry-leading three-year warranty. Digital is
offering a no-penalty upgrade to the Model 600 5/300 at $9,995 for
customers who purchase the Model 600 5/266 through September 1995.

Low-Cost AlphaStation Systems

Digital also introduced new configurations of AlphaStation 200 workstations
with lower price tags, including Model 4/100, the industry's first 64-bit
UNIX workstation for less than $5,000. This entry-level AlphaStation
system is now priced at $4,995, down from $5,995. New entry-level prices
of the AlphaStation 200 4/166 and 4/233 are $10,900 and $14,100
respectively, down from $12,055 and $19,931. Digital's performance
optimizations and memory enhancements enable Digital UNIX Version 3.2C to
reside in 24MB RAM system configurations.

First PCI-Based Family

Digital's AlphaStation line is the industry's first complete, PCI-based
workstation family. The AlphaStation 600 is the first 64-bit
implementation of the industry-standard PCI bus in a workstation. This
high-performance bus enables use of a wide variety of low-cost,
PCI-compatible components and peripherals.

Poised for Growth

Commenting on the new systems and repriced entry-level platforms, Ribeyre
said Digital's AlphaStation family boasts superior application performance
at every price point in the $5,000 to $50,000 range. "Our workstation
business is poised for an era of dramatic growth," he predicted. "We are
uniquely positioned as the only company in the industry offering a
universal platform that supports legacy and next-generation operating
systems, with hardware that offers the best RISC workstation performance
and the attractive pricing and industry standards of the personal computer
market."

ZLXp and E&S 3D Graphics

The addition of the new L series of ZLXp graphics and the Freedom Series
from Evans and Sutherland completes Digital's full line of PCI-based
graphics adapters. Customers can now choose from a complete range of
Digital's adapters, starting at $399 and ranging up to $134,500. Digital's
ZLXp-E series running on the AlphaStation 600 models offers the world's
fastest 2D performance. The new ZLXp-L1 and ZLXp-L2 graphics accelerators,
available immediately, deliver the industry's best midrange 3D graphics
performance for UNIX and Windows NT workstations. The L1, priced at
$2,995, is the industry's fastest 3D graphics card under $5,000, based on
PLBsurf benchmarks. On the Model 5/266, it offers 21.5 percent more
performance than Sun's new Turbo ZX graphics on a SPARCstation 20/71, and
is priced 75 percent lower. Similarly, the L2, priced at $5,995, is the
industry's fastest 3D graphics board for under $15,000. In PLBsurf, it
scored 165 compared to 126 for HP's new Visualize 24 on the J200
workstation. The L2 on the Model 5/266 outpaced SGI's Indigo2 Extreme
workstation by 58 percent running several benchmarks with the EDS
Unigraphics application.

Evans & Sutherland's Freedom Series graphics subsystems offer the world's
fastest high-end graphics performance. On AlphaStation systems, the
graphics subsystems boast the industry's fastest OpenGL performance. They
are ideal for such markets as visual simulation, mechanical CAD,
computer-aided molecular design, and animation. The Freedom Series Models
3150, 3250, and 3400 are priced at $65,000, $83,000, and $134,500,
respectively. They will be available in October.

New Multimedia Offerings Boost Productivity

Digital is announcing a complete family of multimedia enhancements for its
AlphaStation line. These additions put Digital in the lead in
heterogeneous productivity solutions and standards- based multimedia
computing. The multimedia family consists of new and enhanced multimedia
programming interfaces, new video capture boards, speech recognition
software, and collaborative computing software solutions that include a
wide range of videoconferencing options. Major offerings, available
immediately, include:

     o  Through the use of Digital's multimedia programming
        interfaces -- Multimedia Services for Digital UNIX and
        OpenVMS, and Digital Light and Sound Pack for Windows NT --
        AlphaStation system users can store and play back virtually
        any audio or video file.  The interfaces support a variety
        of video file formats, including JPEG, the most commonly
        used format across LANs; MPEG-1, widely used across the
        Internet; and Intel's Indeo, which is popular among PC
        users.  These multimedia software products also contain the
        software drivers for video capture boards;

     o  FullVideo Supreme JPEG board for video capture and subsystem
        display or recording, with realtime codec (compression-
        decompression) of 3D animation, priced at $1,495;

     o  FullVideo Basic adapter card, based on technology licensed
        from ATI Technologies, Inc., with programmed I/O for video
        capture and realtime quarter-screen, 30-frame-per-second
        display, priced at $399;

     o  Communique! Starter, Step Up, Premium Kit, and Value Kit for
        collaborative computing -- Communique! Starter, included
        with all AlphaStation systems, provides "whiteboarding"
        across multivendor networks running UNIX and Windows NT.  It
        enables realtime sharing of text, graphics, and sharing of
        applications.  Communique! Step Up, priced at $1,800, is the
        software upgrade to full Communique!  It enables full audio
        and video conferencing.  Premium Kit, priced at $3,269,
        includes the Communique! Step Up license and software, a
        FullVideo Supreme JPEG video card, a video camera, and
        speakers.  The Value Kit, priced at $2,349, includes the
        Communique! Step Up license and software, a FullVideo Basic
        video capture board, and a video camera for the Windows NT
        environment;

     o  Video Camera, a low-cost, high-quality video camera priced
        at $595, complements Digital's video capture boards;

     o  Video Conferencing Turnkey System configuration includes
        AlphaStation 200 4/100 workstation with 32MB of memory, 1GB
        of disk, CD-ROM, a ZLXp-E1 graphics accelerator, a 17-inch
        color monitor, and the Communique! Step Up Premium Kit.
        Available for the Digital UNIX operating system, it is
        priced at $10,995; and

     o  A speaker-independent speech recognition software package
        developed by Digital and licensed from Dragon Systems, Inc.,
        will be available on Digital UNIX and Windows NT systems
        later this year.  It will have a 500-word vocabulary with
        256 active words for controlling business productivity
        applications such as calendar, calculator, electronic mail,
        text editors, and Motif and Windows NT Session Managers,
        plus additional user-defined applications.

Marketing Initiatives for Technical Computing

AlphaStation systems are designed to push the performance envelope for
Digital's expanding market presence in five key technical market segments:
mechanical design automation (MDA), electronic design automation (EDA),
software development, geographic information systems (GIS), and science
and research.

Digital is launching a Technical Solutions Initiative to focus its direct
sales force and channel partners on these strategic markets. This
initiative includes a focused large account program, large scale demand
generation programs together with targeted software partners, demo and
evaluation unit programs, extensive use of electronic marketing, and
enhanced partner programs for Digital's reseller channel.

Digital Equipment Corporation is the world's leader in open client/server
solutions from personal computing to integrated worldwide information
systems. Digital's scalable Alpha platforms, storage, networking, software
and services, together with industry-focused solutions from business
partners, help organizations compete and win in today's global
marketplace.
 
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