IntelliStation M Pro poised to take over the worldIntelliStation M Pro poised to take over the world

"We want total world domination," jokes Jay Barrett, from International Business Machines Corporation (IBM, Durham, NC). But when it comes to the company's IntelliStation M Pro, he isn't really joking. "This is more than just a PC on steroids. This was specifically designed for the needs of MCAD/MCAE, EDA, DCC, finance, and software engineering users," says Barrett. Several features set the workstation apart from those already on the market. A performance enhancement program (PEP) is a little engine that sits on the system and optimizes the hardware, changing settings as you work. "We took the characterization work normally done in an engineer's brain and wrote it into a soft-ware package," says Barrett. Improved system performance includes: a 33% bandwidth increase for the CPU; 50% bandwidth increase for the L2 Cache; a new 100-MHz front bus, and dual processor enabler. The station supports everything from AGP-based Matrox Millennium II with 8 Mbytes of on-board memory to Intergraph GT geometry accelerator and Appian graphics. The user can choose what level of performance he or she prefers. "Prior to this, IBM was just keeping up with the Jones. Now, look out," Barrett says. The Windows NT-based workstation is immediately available.