Editing Sequent Computer Systems (section)

===Balance===
Sequent's first computer systems were the Balance 8000 (released in 1984) and Balance 21000 (released in 1986).<ref>{{Cite book 
   |author1=R. W. Hockney |author2=C. R. Jesshope 
   |title=Parallel Computers 2: Architecture, Programming and Algorithms 
   |publisher=Taylor & Francis |year=1988 |page=46 
   |isbn=0-85274-811-6}}</ref> Both models were based on 10&nbsp;MHz [[National Semiconductor]] [[NS32000|NS32032]] processors, each with a small write-through cache connected to a common memory to form a [[Shared memory architecture|shared memory]] system. The Balance 8000 supported up to 6 dual-processor boards for a total maximum of 12 processors.<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://homepages.inf.ed.ac.uk/cgi/rni/comp-arch.pl?Shmem%2Fsb.html%2CShmem%2Fsb-f.html%2CShmem%2Fmenu-seq.html |title=Archived copy |access-date=2022-07-17 |archive-date=2016-04-12 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160412082437/http://homepages.inf.ed.ac.uk/cgi/rni/comp-arch.pl?Shmem%2Fsb.html%2CShmem%2Fsb-f.html%2CShmem%2Fmenu-seq.html |url-status=dead }}</ref><ref>{{Cite book | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=FJRVm8pDO9cC&q=balance+8000+sequent&pg=PT229 |title = Creative Destruction: Why Companies That Are Built to Last Underperform the Market--And How to Success fully Transform Them|isbn = 9780307779311|last1 = Foster|first1 = Richard|last2 = Kaplan|first2 = Sarah|date = 2011-04-20| publisher=Crown }}</ref><ref name="cs.berkeley.edu">[http://www.cs.berkeley.edu/~culler/machines/sequent.ps Machines. Sequent] cs.berkeley.edu</ref> The Balance 21000 supported up to 15 dual-processor boards for a total maximum of 30 processors.<ref name="cs.berkeley.edu"/><ref name="unixreview198604_sequent">{{ cite magazine | url=https://archive.org/details/sim_unix-review_1986-04_4_4/page/79/mode/1up | title=Growth in Balance | magazine=UNIX Review | date=April 1986 | access-date=24 June 2022 | pages=79–80 }}</ref>

The systems ran a modified version of [[Berkeley Software Distribution|4.2BSD]] [[Unix]] the company called [[DYNIX]], for DYNamic unIX. The machines were designed to compete with the [[Digital Equipment Corporation|DEC]] [[VAX-11/780]], with all of their inexpensive processors available to run any process. In addition the system included a series of libraries that could be used by programmers to develop applications that could use more than one processor at a time.