IBM gives mainframe another push

Big Blue has begun selling its new high-end mainframe computer, which it claims can dramatically cut power costs, although prices for the box do start at $1m.

IBM claims its beefy new z10 System, which is equivalent to 1,500 x86 servers, will help government agencies and businesses push down energy costs by up to 85 per cent.

The tech firm, which is also punting mid-range mainframes that start at about $100,000, boasts the 64-processor machine has a 50 per cent performance improvement compared to its z9 predecessor.

Over the past five years Big Blue has injected $1.5bn into adapting and developing mainframe technology that can cope with a deluge of web-based apps.

It reckoned that, despite industry chatter which predicts mainframe computing will soon be a thing of the past, it has in fact seen revenue in that sector climb 18 per cent in the last year, off the back of brisk demand from emerging markets such as China, Brazil, and India.

"This single system is capable of consolidating the work of up to thousands of servers – sweeping the floor of the data center and reducing energy consumption, required floor space and the slew of costs associated with distributed server environments," said IBM general manager Jim Stallings.

IBM's press release is here. ®