home
***
CD-ROM
|
disk
|
FTP
|
other
***
search
/
Power Tools 1993 November - Disc 2
/
Power Tools Plus (Disc 2 of 2)(November 1993)(HP).iso
/
cpet
/
watch
/
cw930302
/
febibm.txt
< prev
next >
Wrap
Text File
|
1993-03-16
|
11KB
|
197 lines
IBM Corporation
RS/6000 Announcements, February 1993
In February, IBM briefed analysts on its 1992 RISC System 6000 results,
announced several new products, provided more details about its new
PowerParallel supercomputer, and outlined its basic directions for the balance
of 1993.
1992 Results
Bill Filip who runs IBM's Austin-based Advanced Workstation Division (AWD)
stated that the group achieved profitability by Q4, 1992. As part of IBM's
ongoing restructuring efforts, AWD has P/L responsibility for all Power
Architecture products -- including AIX development. These reporting
responsibilities do NOT, however, extend to dedicated field sales and marketing
staff. Therefore, the RS/6000 must still fight for mindshare in the field
organization with IBM's other product lines. Product specialization is at the
discretion of branch and district management.
IBM has begun to get serious about the commercial market for RISC Unix products.
50% of IBM's RS/6000 business in 1992 came from commercial applications. This
means that the PowerServer line is increasingly being used for applications such
as multi-user RDBMS and Oracle financials. In Europe there is also indication
that Unix-to-Unix client-server applications involving both Powerstation clients
and Powerservers are being developed by IBM's ISV and VAR partners.
As an interesting footnote to the commercial market review, the much discussed
PowerPC products under joint development with Apple and Motorola will belong to
Entry Systems in Boca Raton. The Advanced Workstation Group will, however, also
use the next-generation 6XX chips produced through the Motorola alliance in
future RS/6000 workstation products. Thus it now appears that the semiconductor
technology deal will drive both a new entry-systems personal computer with a
Macintosh interface (PowerPC) as well as next generation RS/6000 technical
workstations and servers.
IBM stated that all its RS/6000 product lines grew in units and revenue in 1992.
IBM experienced revenue growth of approximately 30% -- which was healthy but
below their original business plan projections. One key research finding is
that the low-end model 220 exploded for IBM last year -- especially in Europe.
Although the 220 was only in volume customer ship for approximately six months,
32% of IBM's RS/6000 shipments came from this low-end product. This interesting
growth situation occurred despite the fact that IBM introduced the 220 in
January 1992 with little evidence of real interest in the low-end market -- and
with relatively mediocre performance characteristics for the single chip RIOS
implementation.
The real news from this February announcement is that IBM has become excited
about the low-end market segment and in a 180 degree shift from 12 months ago is
now extremely aggressive about it.
There were four workstation announcements that are evidence of how IBM is
turning up the heat as we approach the end of the Power Architecture's
first-generation RIOS life cycle.
New Workstation Announcements
M20 Diskless Color
Perhaps the most widely-publicized piece of the announcement focused on the
Model M20 -- a diskless entry desktop with 17" color monitor, keyboard, mouse,
integrated networking ports, integrated 2D graphics and distributed system
software license for $3995.
In line with recent Sun pricing, IBM also offers the M20 in volume quantity
for $2995.
Keep in mind that the M20 is based upon the 33 MHz single chip RIOS implemen-
tation first used last year in the Model 220. While IBM pricing yields
excellent price per SPEC results, raw performance is still missing here. The
M20 at 27 SPECfp92 is only slightly better than the new Sun Classic (21) and
compares poorly to HP's 715/33 at 45.
Aberdeen, therefore, views this announcement as a cleverly marketed inventory
clearance program in advance of the next-generation 6XX-based chip machines due
out toward the end of 1993.
X-Terminal Model 150
IBM introduced the X-Station 7010 Model 150. Combining a base unit (with 6 Megs
of memory, flash memory software, 2MB video memory, keyboard, mouse) with a 17"
monitor, and Ethernet the list pricing is $5539. Most notable in the X-Station
announcement was an increase in graphics performance. The Model 150 is
typically 3-5X faster than predecessor products like the 130 in measurements
such as Xstones and X11. However, IBM's overall graphics performance has
trailed other suppliers -- even including Digital who added X11 performance
accelerators to the motherboard in 1992.
While IBM X-Terminals are now improved, graphics is still a weak link for IBM.
In Aberdeen's opinion, the new graphics cards announced for its workstation line
do not solve these underlying performance deficiencies.
Desktop 300 Series
IBM incorporated the higher MHz chipsets announced last year in its 300 Series
desktop, microchannel-based Powerstation line with three new machines, Models
355, 365 and 375. It also dramatically improved price performance ratios.
For example, the Model 375 uses the 62.5 MHz chipset has 32-128 MB memory, 400
MB-2GB of DASD, integrated SCSI and Ethernet and is priced at $24,220. IBM
positioned the Model 375 against Sun Sparc 10, claiming 86% better SPECfp92
performance for less money!
The Model 355 uses a 42 MHz part and costs $14,720, while the 365 fits in the
middle with a 50 MHz chipset at $18,220. All models include GT3i graphics,
keyboard/mouse, a 16" monitor, and AIX 3.2 software as standard equipment.
300 Series Server Options
The Model 360 and 370 versions of the product are server configurations offering
the same 50 and 62.5 MHz processors but 16-256 MB of memory priced at $14,900
and $20,900. Obviously, the graphics subsystems have been removed to achieve
these price points.
For its performance comparisons on the commercial server line, IBM selected to
go head-to-head with HP. IBM positions its PowerServer Model 370 against the HP
9000 Model H30 and states that for 11% less money on a configured system ($76K
versus $83K) the Model 370 produces 28% more in SPECint92 and 55% more in
floating point performance as a compute server.
POWERserver 570
The PowerServer 570 is a new model in IBM's deskside line, fitting in just under
the Model 580 (62.5 MHz) introduced in September, 1992. The new 570 is similar
in packaging to the 580, but employs a 50 MHz chipset and has a base price of
$37,500.
When delivered in a server configuration, the 570 includes 64 MB memory, 4GB
storage, a CDROM, plus Fortran and C licenses. IBM offers same day service at
no additional charge. Price with 128 user AIX systems software is $94,354. --
compared to $101,180 for an HP 9000 H30 according to IBM. And once again, IBM
claims 28% more SPECint92 performance than the customer gets from HP on its H30
model.
In addition to these strongly stated "Best Customer Value" messages, IBM
introduced its Transaction Processing Council "C" benchmarks for the RS/6000.
The TPC-Cs better characterize the more complex transaction models that
customers are facing in new client-server applications. Meanwhile the Model 570
also achieved a rating of 120+ TPC-A.
New Network File Server
For its continued assault on the commercial market, IBM unveiled the 7051 Power
Network Dataserver. Using a loosely coupled multiprocessing design, the 7051
can scale to achieve over 2000 network file system (NFS) I/O transactions per
second. The machine also takes advantage of IBM AIX disk striping and disk
mirroring capabilities.
Supercomputer Initiatives
Advanced Workstation Division announced a joint venture with IBM sister
division, Enterprise Systems group which last year organized the Highly Parallel
Supercomputing Systems Laboratory in Kingston, New York. Headed by IBM
scientist Irving Wladawsky-Berger, the Supercomputing Group introduced a new
series called PowerParallel. These machines will use between 8 and 64 RISC
processors plus high performance switching technology and cost between $312K and
$2.7 million. The goal is to have connectivity with IBM mainframes for an
increasing number of commercial, analytical applications requiring supercomputer
performance -- as well as claiming object code compatibility with existing
RS/6000 applications software. IBM sees increasing room for massively parallel
machines in their traditional datacenter environments. General availability for
the PowerParallel is promised for September, 1993 -- but Aberdeen is extremely
cautious about any wild amount of general customer interest until next year at
the earliest. There is further competitive information on this market in
Aberdeen's recent competitive analysis concerning the HP-Convex alliance
(January 1993).
Summary
IBM has decided to mount an aggressive campaign against Sun and HP for the
low-end in 1993. Based upon last year's better-than-expected market acceptance
of the Model 220, IBM views this market segment as the best growth opportunity
for the next 12-18 months.
Aberdeen has two perspectives on IBM's marketing approach. First, we underscore
that these new machines are not based upon a next generation of the Power RISC
technology. IBM typically announces price cuts such as these 6-9 months in
advance of new product introductions. This cycle strategy appears to us to be
business as usual with the first of the Motorola alliance-based 6XX chips due
out this fall.
Second, we believe that IBM's push to the low-end may well be the result of
having little price/performance advantage at the high-end. Model 300 and 900
rack mount sales may be flat simply because IBM has been slow to move to more
powerful RIOS technology even after 2+ years. Although this round of
announcements is characterized by extremely competitive price performance in the
300 Series and down, we caution that this is based upon first generation Power
RISC technology, and that an inventory clearance sale is clearly in progress.
IBM still does not offer symmetric multiprocessing (SMP) support in either
hardware or AIX, and it appears that IBM will now wait until introducing the
6XX PowerPC chips before moving to SMP. While the first RIOS architecture has
been effectively positioned for two years, Aberdeen now is more convinced than
ever that it will not scale for multiprocessing. This pushes large scale
SMP-based multi-user AIX servers out well into 1994, and is a disappointment for
customers who have topped out the rack-mounted 980 for robust production-level
RDBMS applications.