IBM has just entered another engineering product planning cycle for its iSeries server just as it is in final development of the Power5-based servers, which are expected to ship sometime in the first half of 2004.
It is common knowledge it will eventually deliver the Power5 processor across the entire iSeries product line. But, unlike this year, there will not be a major iSeries announcement in the first quarter of 2004. So the machines you see today are the ones you will be able to buy next year.
So it looks like IBM’s immediate plans for the iSeries for 2004 are not exactly clear, and that is not because IBM doesn’t know what it is doing, but because it is keeping secrets.
That brings us to Power6. When it comes out (late in 2006 or early in 2007), it will apparently be available at very low prices, which will allow IBM to put it into affordable entry iSeries (and presumably pSeries) servers through 2008 or so.
After that, what the Power7 and Power7 plus chips might look like, and how they will be used in iSeries machines in 2009 and 2010 is anyone’s guess.
This article was based on material originally published by ComputerWire.
