Power processor

Sep 3 2009   12:56PM GMT

Power7 speed to be cycled down

Posted by: Mark Fontecchio
Power processor

Earlier this summer I wrote about the upcoming Power7 processor, including some of the major features. The Cliff Notes:

• Four, six, or eight cores
• Four computing threads per core, for a total capacity of 32 computing threads per chip
• DDR3 memory
• Due out by mid-2010

Well, at the HotChips conference at Stanford University last week, IBM revealed some more details for the upcoming processor. Though I wasn’t at the show, I was able to talk to Ron Kalla from IBM, who along with Bill Starke was giving a presentation at the show about the processor.

Though Kalla wouldn’t reveal what frequency the chip will run at — which is the detail IBM has been most reluctant to part with — he did say that it will be lower than Power6. This presentation given by IBM indicates Power7 will run at 4.04GHz, but the range is still unclear.

“We did go to a lower frequency to get a better power optimization point,” he said.

As a result, he said, customers running Power7-based systems will have “basically identical power consumption” to those running Power6-based servers. IBM is pushing this talking point a lot, because it wants as many Power6 users as possible to upgrade to Power7, and this could be an incentive.

This marks a clear departure with IBM’s push behind Power6, which was centered around clock speed. Back then, IBM bragged that the chips were hitting close to 5GHz in the labs. But experts at the time questioned whether cycle speed was the ultimate and only attribute of a good processor.

“The industry, Intel, was going to get away from talking about clock speeds and start talking about heavy lifting, like multi-threading,” one analyst, Charles King, said.

“Is a four-gig Power6 processor possible? I’m sure they could do it,” another analyst, Clay Ryder, added. “But I’m not sure the market is leaning toward that.”

Now, power-performance is the new metric, rather than just simple clock speed. In addition, IBM wants to push Power Systems as a good solution for Web-serving applications that can handle many users at the same time. Many cores accommodating many virtual machines may be more beneficial to that end that super-high clock speeds.

Jun 9 2009   3:17PM GMT

IBM cuts prices to a bunch of Power Systems upgrades

Posted by: Mark Fontecchio
System i hardware, Power processor

Big Blue has slashed prices for most of 20 different upgrades on Power Systems, some by as much as 54%. Some of the upgrades include moving from a Power 5+ processor to a Power 6, and adding memory. There are two upgrade changes that are price increases.

The announcement letter has a list of all the price changes, but there is also a more detailed look at what the feature upgrades are.

Apr 29 2009   7:41PM GMT

Legacy AS/400 meets the future of IBM i at COMMON 2009

Posted by: Leah Rosin
AS/400, IBM System i user groups, Power processor, vLegaci, Security, document management, Quadrant, php, Zend, 10zig, modernization

While at COMMON, the push-pull of new versus old technologies for the IBM i (AS/400, iSeries, System i) has been an underlying theme. Trevor Perry’s recent assertion that IBM’s marketing of the i could kill the system sets the stage for the discussion. His experience has been shared at the conference and has been debated. On Tuesday I had a couple of great conversations and learned more about a couple of new products that are looking to the future.

The first is Zend PHP Server, which takes DB2 400 to the Web. Mike Pavlak demonstrates Zend PHP tools: Zend Core, Zend Studio for Eclipse, and Zend Platform.

Halcyon Software’s John Dominic, Channel Manager, shared the Systems Management Suite enterprise console interface and the message communicator product that allows two-way communication from a mobile device to the AS/400.

(When Halcyon wasn’t using their flat-screen to show how their products worked, they were challenging attendees to ski jumping on a Wii Fit that the winner got to take home).
Continued »

Apr 28 2009   2:45PM GMT

A taste of COMMON: ILE, IBM releases, Web applications and new products

Posted by: Leah Rosin
AS/400, COMMON, IBM System i user groups, Power processor, ILE, cloud computing, Valence, Web tools, WDSC, virtual tape, SSD, Linux, RPG, Vision Solutions, Smart i, BI solutions, Talend, BCD Clover, Query/400

Day two at COMMON 2009 is under my belt, and the level of news and information was again a bit more than I could take in.

COMMON educational session tidbits
I attended a session at 8 AM (without coffee) on “Taking Advantage of Capacity on Demand” for POWER Systems. The session was led by Mark W. Olson, an IBM Power Systems World Wide Product Manager out of Rochester, Minn. I didn’t know what I was getting in for — maybe I should have read the abstract:

This session digs into how IBM’s Capacity on Demand offerings really work for the Model 570 and 595 processors and memory starting with how they are ordered all the way through how they are paid for. Topics include temporary and permanent activations of processors and memory, contractual requirements, pre-pay or post-pay, trial capacity, how to enable, and more.

On the bright side, if you want to know if you should get the daily or minute-based capacity on demand offering from IBM, just ask me and I’m a fount of knowledge. The session was likely useful for those considering paying for more capacity for their 570 or 595 Power Systems, but it didn’t answer what I consider the first step question, which is: Do I really need more processing power, or are there other tweaks to performance I can make? Again, no fault of Mark’s, just my own lack of reading comprehension.
Continued »

Oct 16 2008   7:58AM GMT

Open letter from Ross Mauri

Posted by: Mark Fontecchio
Operating systems, System i hardware, Power processor

Ross Mauri, the general manager of IBM Power Systems, recently wrote an open letter to the System i community. The point of the letter was to update System i users on the state of the platform, and perhaps to ease some of their fears.

First, the push toward Power6 servers: “In 3Q08, we expect that the majority of IBM i shipments will be on POWER6 processor-based Power Systems, and, as a result, the older System i servers based on POWER5+ technology are gradually being withdrawn,” he wrote. “We expect to complete this transition by the end of 2008.”

Mauri continued in that vein but took it to the software side, writing that all the old System i, iSeries and AS/400 applications will be supported on the new Power servers. Nothing too new there, although it may be a relief to some.

There is also some talk in there about IBM i 6.1, and how the next version will be out in 2010 and is being developed in concert with users through groups like Common.

The letter is worth reading, although reception hasn’t been too fantastic. David Vasta over at IT Knowledge Exchange said:

I have read the letter and it seems very dry and blah. I don’t think Mr. Ross Mauri gets it. I may be wrong but seems like they are still thinking about each OS as a platform and not as one Platform and many OSes.

Others, such as IT Jungle and the System i Network, have speculated that Mauri came out with the open letter to calm fears from System i users who have seen revenue numbers from IBM. We wrote about this back in August when IBM reported second-quarter figures. In short, IBM started talking about a “converged System p” platform, which includes Power6-based servers running AIX and IBM i. That number was up big, in part due to the fact that it was compared to the previous System p line, which didn’t run the System i operating system. Meanwhile, the System i number, which only included older System i servers prior to Power5, dropped off.

Expect those same kind of numbers this week when IBM announces its third-quarter revenue numbers.

Sep 4 2008   8:54AM GMT

Linux wins in straight sets over AIX and System i

Posted by: Mark Fontecchio
Open Source, Logical partitions, Operating systems, System i hardware, Power processor

Every year IBM issues a press release touting its IT support for the U.S. Open tennis tournament in Flushing Meadows, N.Y. In past years, they have always talked about the Power processor technology and the benefits of System p and i, as well as Linux on i and p.

This year, their message is about going “green.” Surprise.

Not only that, but read into the details and you’ll discover that they’re only running Linux on Power now. No AIX. No IBM i (they weren’t running IBM i before, but still).

Timothy Prickett Morgan has a good, albeit short, piece, grousing about this U.S. Open development.

Considering that IBM doesn’t own a Linux operating system and has just rejiggered pricing on i 6.1 and AIX 6.1 to make them more competitive with Linux, the Grand Slam systems that IBM makes available to the U.S. Open, the French Open, and the Australian Open would seem to be a perfect place to show how a mix of AIX and i on Power6 iron is the best way to support modern Web applications. I mean, IBM does want to sell its own operating systems, right? And if AIX and i can’t–or won’t–compete against Linux on a level court with a study and straight net, well, what’s the point?

In past years, we’ve written about IBM running the U.S. Open on the Search400.com site. The backbone of the operation used to be System p5 550 servers running AIX and Linux partitions, with the AIX partitions running player search and feedback applications. Meanwhile, Linux partitions on the System p servers and two System i servers ran other Web-serving applications as well as applications at the event hosting the Web site’s scoring system.

Now, apparently, it’s all Linux. At least it’s still on Power, but like Morgan says, this would be a prime opportunity to show off AIX and IBM i. Instead, Linux takes over the No. 1 seed.

Jul 16 2007   10:06AM GMT

System i and the green skeptic

Posted by: Adam Trujillo
System management, Power processor

One of the claims made by IBM and System i users is that it is more is energy efficient per workload than the equivalent computing power of scaled-out x86 boxes. Writing in the context of mainframes, immediate past president of the IBM user group Share, Robert Rosen, says that scale-out is horrible for energy efficiency because utilization is so low. Of course, the System i isn’t a mainframe, but does the utilization logic apply? Is looking at scaled-out clusters and the System i (or mainframe for that matter) in terms of energy efficiency an apples-to-apples comparison?

The issue of power efficiency and the System i was taken up recently by Chris Maxcer in the System i Network. He wonders how concerned a System i shop needs to be about their environmental contributions, because energy-saving strategies such as virtualization via LPAR allocation or proprietary software, is such a prominent part of the System i architecture.

Furthermore, if the System i is so efficient (and if you have the data that says it is, we’d love to see it), does it matter that IBM is investing in efforts like Project Green or The Green Grid? Sure, IBM has their x-series, blades and other products that could use some greening up in terms of energy efficiency, but what does it mean for System i users?

Speaking of those initiatives, does anyone really believe that IBM’s endeavors are environmentally altruistic? Or do most people recognize that it’s about the economics of power and the electricity bill that pops up on the CIO’s or CFO’s desk every month? One way to assess the integrity of these initiatives is to look at Gartner’s recent analysis of The Green Grid’s work. The consortium’s membership is heavy on vendors and light on end-user representation, meaning that the motives could point to self-interest. In other words, under the rubric of environmentally responsible green computing, who’s to say that a group of manufacturers, including System i creators IBM, aren’t just offering products that they deem energy efficient without the accountability of user feedback?

In all fairness, IBM did recently offer the new Power6 processor, which comes a premium price. The chip is twice as fast as the previous generation using almost no more energy. That is putting your R&D where your mouth is, isn’t it? The corporate skeptic in me, though, looks at the price and questions whether IBM isn’t just profiteering from the green computing craze. It’s hard to blame them, though. They are a business after all. Who says being green isn’t profitable?

Jun 20 2007   9:34AM GMT

Comparing the System i to Unix boxes

Posted by: Mark Fontecchio
iSeries software, Operating systems, System i hardware, Power processor

In this detailed article, Timothy Prickett Morgan from IT Jungle compares System i price and performance to Unix boxes from IBM, Hewlett-Packard and Sun Microsystems.

I suggest reading the story if you want all the dirty details, including tables with all the specs. But the bottom line conclusions by Morgan are these:

• System i entry boxes should have the Power6 chip sooner rather than later.
• i5/OS is too expensive.
• DB2 on the System i is too expensive.

Morgan said System i lags on price-performance more because of the software than the hardware.

May 30 2007   6:37AM GMT

Does System i need Power6 right away?

Posted by: Mark Fontecchio
Power processor

Maybe IBM announced Power6-based servers on System p before System i because System i doesn’t need Power6 as badly. It all comes down to System p customers hungering for more and more processing power. Meanwhile, System i folks can take advantage of features like capacity on demand and get by until the Power6-based i machines hit the market.

That’s just another reason to focus the POWER6 on the Unix world. If Unix is constantly hungry for more power . . . but the System i world is relatively not as hungry . . . no wonder IBM has had a tough time making quarterly financial reports that show positive revenue growth for the System i group.

Sure, every hardware manufacturer has this same problem, but I can’t help but believe it hits the System i harder than others.

May 23 2007   7:14AM GMT

Why Power6 news is focused around System p

Posted by: Mark Fontecchio
System i hardware, Power processor

The IBM Power6 processor news hit this week, and in case you hadn’t seen it, it’s all about the System p. Sure, System i got a quick mention in some stories because its Power6-based systems will be here late this year or early next. But System p is a strong growth platform for IBM, especially recently, while System i simply is not.

Here’s a hint at another reason: System i is a banana, while other midrange platforms from Sun, HP and IBM itself are oranges. Check out Chris Maxcer’s blog about the Power6 release to read up on this fruit analogy.