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Viability of Itanium-- was Intel found to be abusing market power in Japan
On Wed, 23 Mar 2005 03:53:34 GMT, "Delbert Cecchi"
wrote: "Robert Myers" wrote in message .. . On Wed, 23 Mar 2005 01:17:28 GMT, "Delbert Cecchi" wrote: snip Do you think the HP enterprise servers have the critical mass to support Itanium development, if Intel were to back away? IBM had to converge, Sun is getting wobbly about sparc or so it seems. I have a very hard time imagining a scenario in which Intel walks away from Itanium. Just because I can't imagine it doesn't mean it won't happen. Why would Intel stay with it? Desktop and small servers belongs to x86-64 from Intel and AMD. Anybody but HP making serious noises about using Itanium? http://uk.news.yahoo.com/050318/221/fehj1.html quote Within the past four years, there have probably been more stories questioning the long-term viability of the Sparc and Itanium architectures than any other architecture in the past several decades, aside from the S/390 mainframe. Both Fujitsu Corp and Siemens AG (Xetra: 723610.DE - news) , the Japanese and German counterparts in the Fujitsu-Siemens partnership, are long-term planners that move slowly and methodically. And they both have every intention of making some money selling Sparc and Itanium servers for the foreseeable future. /quote http://www.infoworld.com/article/05/...mequest_1.html quote Fujitsu to launch new PrimeQuest Itanium servers Slated to be announced April 5, PrimeQuest will be company's first high-end Itanium 2 systems /quote Then there is SGI, of course. I assume that the Altix line will survive somewhere, and that it will use Itanium, if it's available. Any of that amounts to critical mass? I don't think so. Either Intel finds a way for Dell to sell Itanium systems that is profitable for Dell, or that's it for Itanium, but don't underestimate Dell/Intel. The incentive for Dell, other than being obedient to Santa Clara, is that it wants to be in the higher margin businesses just like everybody else does. Opteron hasn't yet and may not ever penetrate much beyond the 2 and 4-way space. That's the next line of defense. If Dell as a volume purveyor of bigger SMP boxes is the way it goes down, Dell will wind up killing margin rather than capturing it, as it always does. Intel manages to establish Itanium as the worthy competitor to Power it wants it to be, Dell creates the value proposition for itanium, and all hell breaks loose again. Or not. One indicator will be market penetration by Opteron in the 8-way space and higher, and how Intel reacts. x86 is already getting hardware virtualization. If x86 starts to acquire the RAS features Intel now intends only for Itanium, we will know that Itanium is dead. HP is sort of stuck, having ported all that stuff from Alpha and PA and nonstop to Itanium, but I don't see anyone else in that boat. The alternatives a use x86 for mainframe applications (politically unacceptable, IMHO), continue investing in Sparc, or become dependent on IBM. RM |
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Robert Myers wrote:
Opteron hasn't yet and may not ever penetrate much beyond the 2 and 4-way space. That's the next line of defense. If Dell as a volume purveyor of bigger SMP boxes is the way it goes down, Dell will wind up killing margin rather than capturing it, as it always does. Intel manages to establish Itanium as the worthy competitor to Power it wants it to be, Dell creates the value proposition for itanium, and all hell breaks loose again. Or not. One indicator will be market penetration by Opteron in the 8-way space and higher, and how Intel reacts. Well, with dual-core, Opteron will be 8-way capable, right? That's getting to be a serious box! |
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"Robert Myers" wrote in message
... If Dell as a volume purveyor of bigger SMP boxes is the way it goes down, Dell will wind up killing margin rather than capturing it, as it always does. "Killing margin" is an interesting phrase. A synonym is "eliminating the middleman markup", which some would see as a desirable goal. Many americans deplore the disappearance of small outlets with high markups, but then the same americans do all their shopping at Walmart. One indicator will be market penetration by Opteron in the 8-way space and higher I too favor the glueless NUMA SMP configurations made possible by Opterons, including 8-way. But when I think of an 8-way motherboard, I think of a farmer showing up with a John Deere tractor, planning to plow the back 40. ;-) And when I think of 8-way Opterons on more than one mobo, I worry about high-speed link connections between boards. I believe I've been reassured before on this NG that such connections are possible. Has this been proven? Are production systems being shipped with 8-way Opterons on multiple boards? |
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Felger Carbon wrote:
"Robert Myers" wrote in message ... If Dell as a volume purveyor of bigger SMP boxes is the way it goes down, Dell will wind up killing margin rather than capturing it, as it always does. "Killing margin" is an interesting phrase. A synonym is "eliminating the middleman markup", which some would see as a desirable goal. Many americans deplore the disappearance of small outlets with high markups, but then the same americans do all their shopping at Walmart. One indicator will be market penetration by Opteron in the 8-way space and higher I too favor the glueless NUMA SMP configurations made possible by Opterons, including 8-way. But when I think of an 8-way motherboard, I think of a farmer showing up with a John Deere tractor, planning to plow the back 40. ;-) And when I think of 8-way Opterons on more than one mobo, I worry about high-speed link connections between boards. I believe I've been reassured before on this NG that such connections are possible. Has this been proven? Are production systems being shipped with 8-way Opterons on multiple boards? I read an article somewhere about an 8-way Opteron system that had two stacked 4P boards. I thought it was an HP system, but I looked just now and couldn't find anything with more than 4P at HP's site. It was probably just a review of something demoed at a show like LinuxWorld and not yet - if ever - available in the retail channel. |
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On Wed, 23 Mar 2005 10:13:29 -0600, chrisv wrote:
Robert Myers wrote: Opteron hasn't yet and may not ever penetrate much beyond the 2 and 4-way space. That's the next line of defense. If Dell as a volume purveyor of bigger SMP boxes is the way it goes down, Dell will wind up killing margin rather than capturing it, as it always does. Intel manages to establish Itanium as the worthy competitor to Power it wants it to be, Dell creates the value proposition for itanium, and all hell breaks loose again. Or not. One indicator will be market penetration by Opteron in the 8-way space and higher, and how Intel reacts. Well, with dual-core, Opteron will be 8-way capable, right? That's getting to be a serious box! Opteron is 8-way capable today, but the mechanics get a little problematic. There is no reason to assume that a dual-Opteron can't reach 8-way on a 4-W board. If you're thinking of a 16P system, AIUI, it's not going to happen. There would have to be changes to the coherent HT links for that to happen. I don't see it, but... -- Keith |
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On Thu, 24 Mar 2005 01:38:36 +0000, Rob Stow wrote:
Delbert Cecchi wrote: "Rob Stow" wrote in message news:sTn0e.766510$8l.13114@pd7tw1no... Ed wrote: On Wed, 23 Mar 2005 17:28:19 GMT, Rob Stow wrote: I read an article somewhere about an 8-way Opteron system that had two stacked 4P boards. I thought it was an HP system, but I looked just now and couldn't find anything with more than 4P at HP's site. 5U rack-optimized servers delivers the 8-Way Opteron power and performance. http://www.iwillusa.com/product_1.asp?pl1_id=63 I only see 4 CPU, 4 on top - 4 on bottom? Ed I don't think that isn't the one I had read about. The one you linked to uses "2 x IWILL QK8S-HT Quad AMD Opteron system board", but I recall that in the pics of the system I was thinking of there were two distinctly different boards. The "lower" one was sort of L shaped while the upper one was a simple rectangle. Regardless, the IWill system is very interesting. newisys. now a unit of some contract manufacturer. Newisys was bought up by Appro. I thought it was bought by Sanmina SCI last summer, but I can't find any reference. -- Keith |
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Ed wrote:
On Wed, 23 Mar 2005 17:28:19 GMT, Rob Stow wrote: I read an article somewhere about an 8-way Opteron system that had two stacked 4P boards. I thought it was an HP system, but I looked just now and couldn't find anything with more than 4P at HP's site. 5U rack-optimized servers delivers the 8-Way Opteron power and performance. http://www.iwillusa.com/product_1.asp?pl1_id=63 I only see 4 CPU, 4 on top - 4 on bottom? Ed I don't think that isn't the one I had read about. The one you linked to uses "2 x IWILL QK8S-HT Quad AMD Opteron system board", but I recall that in the pics of the system I was thinking of there were two distinctly different boards. The "lower" one was sort of L shaped while the upper one was a simple rectangle. Regardless, the IWill system is very interesting. |
#8
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Rob Stow wrote:
Ed wrote: On Wed, 23 Mar 2005 17:28:19 GMT, Rob Stow wrote: I read an article somewhere about an 8-way Opteron system that had two stacked 4P boards. I thought it was an HP system, but I looked just now and couldn't find anything with more than 4P at HP's site. 5U rack-optimized servers delivers the 8-Way Opteron power and performance. http://www.iwillusa.com/product_1.asp?pl1_id=63 I only see 4 CPU, 4 on top - 4 on bottom? Ed I don't think that isn't the one I had read about. LOL! /s/isn't/is The one you linked to uses "2 x IWILL QK8S-HT Quad AMD Opteron system board", but I recall that in the pics of the system I was thinking of there were two distinctly different boards. The "lower" one was sort of L shaped while the upper one was a simple rectangle. Regardless, the IWill system is very interesting. |
#9
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"Robert Myers" wrote in message ... snip Either Intel finds a way for Dell to sell Itanium systems that is profitable for Dell, or that's it for Itanium, but don't underestimate Dell/Intel. The incentive for Dell, other than being obedient to Santa Clara, is that it wants to be in the higher margin businesses just like everybody else does. They can enter those higher margin businesses with the X86-64 from Intel, whatever the code name is. Opteron hasn't yet and may not ever penetrate much beyond the 2 and 4-way space. That's the next line of defense. If Dell as a volume purveyor of bigger SMP boxes is the way it goes down, Dell will wind up killing margin rather than capturing it, as it always does. Go to your strength. Dell's is having the most efficient, lowest cost, most turns, lowest inventory manufacturing. That allows them to compete on price. Near as I can tell, not much added value functionality in a Dell. As opposed to a Del. :-) In a commodity type market that is a great advantage. Intel manages to establish Itanium as the worthy competitor to Power it wants it to be, Dell creates the value proposition for itanium, and all hell breaks loose again. Or not. One indicator will be market penetration by Opteron in the 8-way space and higher, and how Intel reacts. x86 is already getting hardware virtualization. If x86 starts to acquire the RAS features Intel now intends only for Itanium, we will know that Itanium is dead. Have you reviewed the "Hurricane" chip set stuff from IBM? Lots of RAS and it uses X86-64. HP is sort of stuck, having ported all that stuff from Alpha and PA and nonstop to Itanium, but I don't see anyone else in that boat. The alternatives a use x86 for mainframe applications (politically unacceptable, IMHO), continue investing in Sparc, or become dependent on IBM. HP is investing in Sparc? Or is that what is in a nonstop box? RM |
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"Rob Stow" wrote in message news:sTn0e.766510$8l.13114@pd7tw1no... Ed wrote: On Wed, 23 Mar 2005 17:28:19 GMT, Rob Stow wrote: I read an article somewhere about an 8-way Opteron system that had two stacked 4P boards. I thought it was an HP system, but I looked just now and couldn't find anything with more than 4P at HP's site. 5U rack-optimized servers delivers the 8-Way Opteron power and performance. http://www.iwillusa.com/product_1.asp?pl1_id=63 I only see 4 CPU, 4 on top - 4 on bottom? Ed I don't think that isn't the one I had read about. The one you linked to uses "2 x IWILL QK8S-HT Quad AMD Opteron system board", but I recall that in the pics of the system I was thinking of there were two distinctly different boards. The "lower" one was sort of L shaped while the upper one was a simple rectangle. Regardless, the IWill system is very interesting. newisys. now a unit of some contract manufacturer. |
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