Further to yesterday`s announcement that its parent will debut live IA-64 applications at HP World in the US, Hewlett-Packard South Africa has confirmed plans to ship its high-end servers with Intel`s Merced processor in the middle of next year.
The news comes in the wake of much market speculation on the delivery of Merced - the first iteration of Intel`s next generation IA-64 processors. And it confirms HP`s close ties with Intel as a co-developer of EPIC, the technology infrastructure and instruction set that IA-64 is built upon.
While no details of the specific machines that will carry Merced have been released, it is believed HP`s recently-launched N-Class enterprise server will be one of the first. The N-Class ranks as the only server on the market which provides an in-chassis upgrade from the PA-RISC to IA-64 architectures. Rob Schroenn, marketing programmes manager at HP Enterprise Computing Solutions (ECS) SA, believes the combination of HP`s system architecture expertise and IA-64`s parallel processing will make these servers ideal e-services platforms. HP is touting e-services - the combination of e-commerce and e-business - as its major solutions edge for the near future.
HP plans to support HP-UX, the 64-bit version of MicrosoftWindows, and Linux on its Merced systems, and MPE/iX on its future IA-64 systems, thereby offering customers broad application and operating system choice.
"The new servers will pave the way for the wave of Internet and enterprise e-services applications we expect to roll out over the next few years," adds Schroenn.
"Our collaboration with Intel on the 64-bit instruction set architecture enables us to really understand how to harness IA-64`s power and smoothly transition our customers to this new platform."
HP is assuring its customer base that the transition will be a painless one. Existing PA-RISC and IA-32 applications can run unchanged on Merced and future IA-64 systems. The company will also provide consulting services and support to ensure customers transition to the new platform smoothly.
"HP also plans to continue to develop and introduce PA-RISC and IA-32-based systems in parallel with IA-64 systems, enabling customers to migrate to the new architecture as their business needs dictate," concludes Schroenn.
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