A better Wabi, SunPC Wabi 2.1 adds multimedia support, SunPC card speeds to 66-MHz By Michael Parsons

July  1995

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"It's allowing Wabi to support the multimedia features of Windows. We're mapping the audio capability of Microsoft Windows to the audio capabilities of Sun workstations," said Bob Vandette, chief technologist in the PC desktop integration group at SunSoft.

Japanese Wabi 2.0 is scheduled for release in Japan in the third quarter. "It's making Wabi double-byte and supporting Japanese character sets, and it supports the installation and use of the Japanese version of Windows. We are looking into the business case of producing other double- byte implementations of Wabi [such as Chinese], but we've nothing to announce yet," Vandette said.

Sun also launched a new version of its Merge application, which supports DOS applications running on Solaris. Merge 3.2.1 runs on Solaris on the Intel x86 processing environment. At the same time, Sun announced a deal with Locus Computing Corp. to ensure continuing development of Merge on Intel processors. Finally, the company launched an upgrade to its DX2 coprocessor, which speeds the performance of DOS applications running on Solaris. The new SunPC coprocessor is a single-slot SBus card with an 80486 DX2 66-MHz processor.

Support for Windows and DOS applications is important for Sun users. According to Vandette, at least 75 percent would like to run some Windows applications on their workstations. The company is now preparing to meet the demand for support for Windows 95 applications.

"It will be interesting to see how fast Windows 95 and Office 95 take hold," said Vandette. "We'll have solutions by the time the demand for that is there. We're looking at within a year of release of Windows 95. We will support the critical applications that will be running on that platform, on the Wabi product."

Wabi 2.1 will be available in July through Sun resellers and SunExpress, at US$225; upgrades from Wabi 2.0 will cost $80. Wabi 2.1 will be copackaged with future versions of Solaris, when available. French, Italian, German, Spanish and Swedish versions of Wabi 2.1 will be available in the fourth quarter. Pricing and distribution of all international versions has not yet been announced.

Merge for the x86 Operating Environment is available now from SunSoft resellers and SunExpress. Merge is available in two configurations: Desktop, which contains a license for one to two users, and Workgroup, with unlimited licenses on one CPU. The Desktop product costs $295, and the workgroup product is $495.

SunPC DX2 products are bundled with either SunPC 4.1 or SunPC 3.1 software and with the DX2 coprocessor card, and they will be available in August through SunExpress and Sun resellers. Suggested retail pricing is set at $995 for SunPC 4.1 or SunPC 3.1 DX2 bundles, and at $849 for the DX2 coprocessor card only.

Resources

• Wabi 2 Info
  http://www.sun.com/solaris/desktop.html
• Sun Wabi technical knowledge base
  http://www.sun.com/solaris/products/wabi/support/index.html
• SunExpress
  http://www.sun.com/sunexpress/index.html
• Locus Computing Corp.
  http://www.locus.com/
• Merge
  http://www.sun.com:80/sunsoft/Products/PC-Integration-products/products/merge.html

If you have technical problems with this magazine, contact webmaster@sunworld.com

URL: http://www.sunworld.com/swol-07-1995/swol-07-wabi.html
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