A type of large computer system (in the past often water-cooled), the primary data processing resource for many large businesses and organizations. Some mainframe operating systems and solutions are over 40 years old and have the capacity to store year values only as two digits. r /> A large digital computer serving 100-400 users and occupying a special air-conditioned room; SYN. mainframe computer.
Large computer used for commercial data processing and other large-scale operations. Because of the general increase in computing power, the differences between the mainframe, supercomputer, minicomputer, and microcomputer (personal computer) are becoming less marked.
Mainframe manufacturers include IBM, Amdahl, Fujitsu, and Hitachi. Typical mainframes have from 32 to 256 Mb of memory and tens of gigabytes of disc storage.