<If Intel starts running server farms, they'll become direct competition for every other internet hosting organization in the country. Why support your direct competitor if there is anything close to an alternative?>
Excellent point! One of the perils of diversification.
From what I gather, similar thing is happening to Intel with Level One. Level One was going downhill when Intel bought it, and lately Broadcomm is apparently using the competitive issue to steal the few remaining high volume sockets that Level One had. I think Henry Nicholas of Brodcomm is on record for saying something like "we now have one less competitor".
Hooray, another good topic! That was quick.
There are lots of pitfalls in Intel's bid to run webhosting server farms, but I really doubt that other webhosting providers (at least the big guys like Digex, PSINet, UUNet, Exodus, etc.) would switch CPU architecture just to spite Intel. They might be pissed, or they might be hoping to get bought, but frankly their customers typically advise them on what hardware they prefer, and it's frequently Sun. The easiest part of the webhosting business is losing lots of money and these guys have lots of experience at losing money already. Intel stands just as good a chance, maybe better, to lose money as the guys who already know the webhosting business. It's my guess that Intel is in this for promoting the types of rich content on the internet that will consume lots of Xeons, Fosters and Merceds on the server side and lots of Pentium whatevers and Willamettes on the desktop. If that's true, then the server farm subsidy is cheap.
I'm not as familiar with the Level One issues, but it's apparent that Intel is stepping into a playing field where they are the rookies.
Rick |
