Editing Data General (section)

===Final downturn===
[[File:Dg-walkabout-full.jpg|thumb|[[Data General Walkabout]], notebook computer/portable terminal from the turn of the 1990s]]
[[File:Data General small foam terminal promotional item.jpg|thumb|Promotional item c. mid-1990s]]
Despite Data General's betting the AViiON farm on the [[Motorola 88000]],<ref>{{cite web
|title=History of Data General Corporation 
|url=http://www.fundinguniverse.com/company-histories/data-general-corporation-history
|quote=... a long way to go .... Skates proceeded to pare costs and plan Data General's future around the AViiON line.}}</ref>  Motorola decided to end production of that CPU. The 88000 had never been very successful, and DG was the only major customer. When [[Apple Inc.|Apple Computer]] and [[IBM]] proposed their joint solution based on [[IBM POWER Instruction Set Architecture|POWER architecture]], the [[PowerPC]], Motorola picked up the manufacturing contract and killed the 88000.

DG quickly responded by introducing new models of the AViiON series based on a true commodity processor, the [[Intel]] [[x86]] series. By this time a number of other vendors, notably [[Sequent Computer Systems]], were also introducing similar machines. The lack of lock-in now came back to haunt DG, and the rapid commoditization of the Unix market led to shrinking sales. DG did begin a minor shift toward the service industry, training their technicians for the role of implementing a spate of new x86-based servers and the new [[Microsoft]] [[Windows NT]] domain-driven, small server world. This never developed enough to offset the loss of high margin server business however.

Data General also targeted the explosion of the internet in the latter 1990s with the formation of the THiiN Line business unit, led by Tom West, which had a focus on creation and sale of so-called "internet appliances".  The product developed was called the SiteStak web server appliance and was designed as an inexpensive website hosting product.