January:
DIGITAL extends its Network Applications Support (NAS) facilities to integrate MS-DOS, OS/2 and UNIX systems into the open DECnet/OSI network environment.

Network Application Support was a distributed, enterprise-wide computing capability, allowing users to integrate a mixed set of systems and resources into a single, unified whole. NAS extended DIGITAL's desktop solutions of networked VAXservers and desktop products by allowing integration of UNIX, MS-DOS, OS/2 and Macintosh.

April:
DIGITAL introduces the VAX 6000 system platform, based on the CVAX chip.

The first offering in the VAX 6000 series was the midrange VAX 6200, which was built on three key technologies: the DIGITAL CMOS VLSI VAX processor (the CVAX chip), a symmetric multiprocessing hardware and software environment, and the VAXBI I/O interconnect.

April:
VMS version 5.0 is released.

DIGITAL released VMS version 5.0 in concert with the VAX 6200. VMS V 5.0 included symmetric multiprocessing, which provided a high degree of parallelism and more effective use of multiprocessors.

July:
DECtp is introduced.

DECtp was a systems environment that integrated the functions required to build large-scale transaction processing applications, effectively enabling DIGITAL systems to process up to 100 transactions per second.

Digital Storage System Interconnect (DSSI) is introduced for MicroVAX 3300/3400 and higher systems.

DSSI provided a high capacity storage interface similar to the Computer Interconnect (CI) used in VAXcluster systems but at lower cost and in packages suitable for office environments. DSSI became the precursor to the SCSI standard.