World's First Novell Certifed CD-ROM for NetWare 386 July 16, 1991 - Micro Design International, Inc. of Winter Park, Florida, U.S.A., today announced Novell Certification of its CD-ROM subsystem and SCSI Express storage solutions software for NetWare 386 fileservers. The first-of-its-kind interface offers CD-ROM technology on NetWare 386 fileservers through native NetWare volumes. Finally, CD-ROM is made available to an entire network with the assurance of Novell certification and without the need for special drivers of mapping utilities at workstations. SCSI Express provides the transparent interface between NetWare and CD-ROM drives through a standard NetWare disk driver. Users on the network simply access CD-ROMs (such as Novell's Network Support Encylopedia or Ziff Davis's Computer Select) as standard NetWare volumes. Unlike redirector products, SCSI Express does not require the installation of CD-ROM extensions or drivers for a workstation to access CD-ROM data. This approach significantly reduces memory overhead on already over-crowded DOS systems. It also allows OS/2 and other non-DOS workstations access to network CD-ROMs. Because of its standard NetWare interface, SCSI Express extends all of the usual NetWare volume benefits to CD-ROMs as well. For example, NetWare's caching system offers SCSI Express CD-ROM a significant performance advantage. "In a network environment, performance is a serious issue," stated Robert Smith, Director of Engineering at Micro Design. "Under a heavy network load, NetWare cache support and the ability to process simultaneous requests is a requirement." As with all NetWare volumes, NetWare caches file system information for the CD-ROM volume in memory. This cache greatly improves the access time of file data and the speed of database searches on a CD-ROM. NetWare trustee assignments are also available to restrict access to sensitive data. SCSI Express CD-ROM support is just one of MDI's many enterprising storage solutions. Supported devices include the Micro Design LaserBank 600CD as well as a variety of other CD-ROM drives and CD-ROM autochangers. The LaserBank 600CD provides access to both High Sierra and ISO 9660 CD-ROMs and comes in several models that includes single, double, and quad-high subsystems. The single drive LaserBank 600CD internal model is available for $795; the subsystem, for $895. SCSI Express for NetWare 386 is $595. For more information contact Micro Design International, 6985 University Boulevard, Winter Park, FL 32792; 407-677-8333, 407-677-8359 FAX. ###