GOVERNMENT

IBM today announced significant upgrades to the world's most powerful UNIX® server, the IBM eServer™ p690®, increasing memory, performance and lowering costs on many configurations. The enhancements follow last week's record-breaking performance by the p690 on the TPC-C benchmark, as a 32-way p690 outperformed an HP Itanium 2 processor-based Integrity Superdome system with 64 processors, soaring past the million mark to process 1,025,486 transactions per minute at a price/performance of $5.43/tpmC. Today's enhancements to the IBM p690 deliver up to 20% more performance than previous versions, and include: -- Increased CPU performance utilizing the newest POWER4+ processor at 1.9 GHz -- Support for up to 1TB of memory capacity with the introduction of the 128GB memory card, twice the capacity of previous p690 servers -- An upgrade path for customers using p670 and p690 systems to the new p690 1.9GHz system -- Lower list prices for many pSeries p670 and p690 configurations -- The ability for customers to place orders with IBM for selected Linux operating system distributions with initial orders of any pSeries POWER4+ system IBM is taking orders now on the new 1.9 GHz p690 and plans to begin shipping on March 5. The IBM eServer p690 is the most popular high-end UNIX server on the market. According to independent research firm IDC, over the last eight quarters, IBM has shipped more high-end eServer p690 systems than either HP's high-end Superdome UNIX systems or Sun's high-end UNIX systems. With more than 4,000 systems sold since its introduction, the POWER™ processor-based IBM eServer p690 is the foundation of on demand computing infrastructures in industries around the globe. The IBM eServer p690 is also one of the most decorated UNIX servers in the history of performance benchmarks. The IBM eServer p690 system delivers outstanding performance while delivering world-class reliability features and helping to save electricity, maintenance, operating and administrative costs. The p690 is equipped with the ability to run AIX 5L™ and Linux operating systems simultaneously on a single server, and the capability to add, remove, or deploy system resources dynamically through logical partitioning and Capacity on Demand technologies. Having been termed the first 'server on a chip,' IBM's POWER microprocessor architecture is a leading industry solution for 64-bit applications. IBM's POWER architecture offers customers open, innovative technology solutions through either the AIX 5L, OS/400® or Linux operating systems that complement the growing demand for 64-bit applications. In addition to being at the core of the powerful, industry leading IBM eServer systems, the POWER microprocessor technology can be found in Nintendo game consoles, Apple computers, and some of the world's most powerful supercomputers and storage systems.