Some more news on IBM's efforts to 'bulk up' it's Intel based servers...
John
X Architecture for IBM
servers
By Stephen Shankland
Staff Writer, CNET News.com
October 29, 1998, 4:00 a.m. PT
IBM has begun an effort to increase the appeal of
its Intel-based Netfinity servers, adopting
technology from the company's more sophisticated
computers.
The effort, called X Architecture, is designed to
give Netfinity systems some extra muscle as IBM
vies for a larger piece of the increasingly important
Intel/Windows NT server market, a company
spokesman said.
IBM also is working
with Windows NT
maker Microsoft on a
technology called
OnForever that let users
"hot swap" not just hard
disk drives but also fans,
power supplies,
memory, and even processors. Hot swapping is a
fail-safe scheme which allows defective
components to be replaced while the computer is
still running. Traditionally, server computers have to
be shut down for repairs, which can wreak havoc
on company-wide information systems.
Another X Architecture addition to the Netfinity
line is "clustering," the spreading of computing tasks
across several computer "nodes" to make systems
more expandable and better protected from
failures.
"I think it's the right thing to do," said John Oltsik,
an analyst with with Forrester Research.
"Intel-based servers will run [high-end corporate]
enterprise mission-critical applications over time."
But while X Architecture could make Netfinity
more successful, that success could come at the
expense of IBM's in-house line of AS/400 servers,
he said.
If the market wants to move sophisticated tasks to
Windows NT machines, "then IBM is willing to
follow that trend, even if it means stepping on
AS/400 along the way," said Oltsik. "That's a
healthy attitude for IBM. If they don't, they lose
both the AS/400 and the NT business," Oltsik said.
IBM's Netfinity sales have grown, but not as fast as
its competitors' comparable offerings, Oltsik noted.
Boston-based Aberdeen Group agreed, saying in a
recent paper that IBM's lack of attention to its
Netfinity line was a "strategic misstep that has
caused Netfinity to cede market share to
Hewlett-Packard, Compaq, and Dell."
IBM's Michael Liebow acknowledges that the
company "kneecapped" the Netfinity servers to
protect its mid-range server line--the AS/400
machines. But IBM "woke up and is throwing
everything" at the Intel server platform now, he
said.
Other X Architecture offerings in the works include
eight-processor systems based on Intel's
forthcoming 64-bit chips, special connections to
high-end IBM S/390 servers, a "light path" system
that automatically directs troubleshooters to faulty
equipment with a chain of lights, and the MoST
(Mobile Service Terminal) Connect system of
diagnosing an ailing machine by plugging a
diagnostic computer into a special port.
However, Oltsik noted, IBM's migration of
top-end server technology to relatively low-end
Netfinity servers is nothing new for the industry. "I
don't think IBM is doing anything that Compaq and
HP haven't thought of many times," he said.
"Compaq and HP both have extensive enterprise
technologies and skills they're looking to bring
downstream as well."
Compaq, for example, is working with its Tandem
division and Microsoft to make NT systems more
fault-tolerant. Compaq also is working on clustering
technology, he added.
Oltsik also believes that the X Architecture could
be getting ahead of the software because Windows
NT isn't robust enough to benefit. "For the most
part, NT is not running mission-critical applications
in large companies. That's where Unix and the
mainframe own the environment," he said.
But when the next version of Windows NT arrives
and more companies put critical functions on
Intel/NT systems, IBM's X Architecture could pay
off.
The new technology, whether from IBM, Compaq,
or HP, is good for users, he declared. "Ultimately,
users get commodity boxes with enterprise
features," Oltsik said.
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