Sybase this week announced a Cluster Edition for its core database product, Sybase Adaptive Server Enterprise, with an ability to generate multiple database clusters on one set of physical servers.

David Jonker, senior product manager, said Cluster Edition included a new feature in clustering, Virtualized Resource Management. VRM allows subdividing the physical cluster into multiple, logical units, each of which "can have its own applications and its own rules for load balancing and failover," Jonker said in an interview.

VRM may also be used to move workloads around, allowing for some of the servers to undergo downtime for maintenance, without disrupting database applications, Jonker said. Horsepower for particular workloads can be periodically increased or phased out, depending on need, through management of the virtualized resource.

Cluster Edition managers can get information on the state of all the servers in the cluster and make decisions on how best to deploy service levels during periods of peak loads, system failure or changing application needs.

Sybase has applied for five patents on the Virtualized Resource Management, he said.

Cluster Edition is available for Sybase ASE 15.0.1 and may be run on up to 32 nodes in a cluster using a shared disk storage area network. It is available immediately to run on Solaris 9 and 10, Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4 and 5, and Novell SUSE Linux 9 and 10. It runs on both x86 and UltraSparc servers, but mixed hardware in the cluster isn't recommended, Jonker said.

Cluster Edition is priced at $60,000 per CPU, with an Enterprise Edition Sybase ASE database license, list price $35,000, included.

Sybase previously offered data replication software with Sybase ASE but not a complete clustering system.