IBM extends solidDB database-accelerator tech

IBM has extended its solidDB database acceleration cache software to work with non-IBM databases.

SolidDB was launched in June this year and, at the time, worked with Informix Dynamic Server (IDS) and IBM DB2 databases. On Monday, IBM announced support for Microsoft SQL Server, Oracle and Sybase as well.

According to IBM, applications running with the cache can generate workload speeds of more than 120,000 transactions per second. The aim is to provide the ability to "support growing numbers of users and data volumes", the company said in a statement.

The main advantage of the cache is that accessing performance-critical data from one of the supported disk-based databases is much faster, as it can be accessed from RAM rather than having to go to the disk, IBM said.

"In January, we acquired Solid Information Technology and, shortly thereafter, released solidDB Cache for DB2 and Informix Dynamic Server," said Arvind Krishna, vice president of data management at IBM. "Today, we are announcing that the extreme speed capabilities of solidDB will be available to an even larger number of businesses, allowing them to process their growing data volumes faster than ever before."

IBM solidDB Universal Cache will be generally available in December, with support for DB2, IDS, Oracle and Sybase, the company said. Support for Microsoft SQL Server will follow in the first quarter of 2009, according to IBM.

IBM has not released any information on price at this stage.