IBM AUSTRALIASHIFTS INTO TOP
GEAR
fter several months of uncharacteristic inactivity, IBM
Australia has finally opened
the floodgates with a variety of PC
product announcements. Within thespace of a few weeks, a mouthwatering smorgasbord of PC
products and services has beenpresented to a hungry local market.
First of all came the local
announcement of the IBM 4700
Personal Computer, only weeks after
its US premiere (see PC Hotline).
This PC variant links in the widelyused IBM 4700 FinanceCommunication System (FCS) withthe advantages of standalone PCs.
The 4700 PC can interface withmagnetic card readers and keypads
for entering PINs (personalidentification numbers), as well as
passbook printers,
encryption/decryption units andother devices in the 4700 FCS
family. Options were also announced
to add these features to existing PCs
and PC XTs, although, like the3270-PC, the range of 4700 PC
products is only being marketed
through IBM directly, rather thanthrough authorised PC dealers.
Only a few days later, theInfosearch electronic help databasefor PC users was announced (alsodescribed in PC Hotline), as themainframe-based system finally cameon line at IBM's new corporate
headquarters in Cumberland Forest,
north-west of Sydney.
The 43XX mainframe nestles inthe basement of the new complex,
sharing an environmentallycontrolled room with some of themost powerful and well-protectedA

90 AUSTRALIAN PC WORLD - JULY 1985

computers in the country. (A deep
trench surrounds the basement as
prevention from possible terrorist
attacks, and both indoor andoutdoor cameras monitor the area
24 hours a day)
The Infosearch announcement
reflects similar services that havelong been available in the US andEurope, and signifies IBM's
recognition of the increasing
importance of being seen to support
PC users, many of whom are at thestage of considering buying
additional systems.
Just over a week later came what
was perhaps the biggest and best
announcement by IBM Australia —the local release of the Enhanced
Graphics Adapter, Enhanced Color
Display Professional Graphics
Controller, Professional Graphics
Display and the PC Graphics
Development Toolkit.
These pfoducts have been long

The PC 1X has been heavily promoted in Japan.
awaited in Australia, and manyobservers believed that IBM had
possibly been stalling their release
until the PC AT was available. The
new graphics products adhere to theGraphical Kernel System (GKS),
which now stands a good chance of
becoming the new standard in highresolution PC graphics. (GKS isdescribed more fully inthe article on page 69).
The new IBM graphics products
were announced as part of a larger
package known as the PC
Engineering/Scientific series. This
series also includes the PC Data
Acquisition and Control Adapter(with distribution panel and software
support), the PC GPIB Interface Bus
Adapter and PC Professional Fortran— a complete ANSI-77 version withextensions. In contrast to the 4700
PC financial products, all of theEngineering/Scientific series areavailable through authorised IBM PC
dealers.
Despite this flurry ofannouncements, several questions
remain — when is the PC II going
to be released in Australia, and what
about the PC JX? The answer to thefirst question is still anybody's guess,but the second question is far more
intriguing.
The PC JX is an enhanced versionof the PCjr, developed by IBM Japanand released late last year. In asurprise move, the Victorian
Education Department recently
announced that it considered the JXsuitable for purchase for schools,
despite the fact that the low-end
system had not been officiallyannounced in Australia by IBM, andperhaps never will be.
The JX contains 3' in Matsushita
disk drives, which represents a
potent force in establishing this as
the future microfloppy disk standard.
Even more interesting is the fact that
the JX has not been released in theUS, raising the possibility that
Australia is being used as a test
market by IBM, which has alreadyburnt its fingers once with the illfated PCjr.
Whatever the outcome, IBM's
recent PC-related announcements are
merely the harbinger of a further,more exciting series, including thelong-awaited laptop portable and(eventually) the PC II.
— IAN ROBINSON