PC servers reach for the sky

It was not long ago that fear, uncertainty and doubt about the three abilities of Intel-based systems - scalability, reliability and availability - dominated the PC server marketplace. The lack of these features, combined with the inability of Microsoft`s Windows NT to guarantee the necessary uptime, made the Wintel unfit for the mid-range and high-end environments. But the arrival of systems based on Intel`s new Xeon processors has restored the interest in business-critical computing on the Intel platform.

As one Comaq enterprise marketing director put it: "Finally we can say 'yes` when people ask if PC servers can scale." Server vendors are now touting "five-nines reliability" referring to 99.999% uptime on the new generation of PC servers, which in addition to Windows NT run other operating systems - NetWare, Unix and Linux.

So what magic did Intel pull out with its Xeon chips?

Faster and bigger cache is critical in a server environment. The Pentium II Xeon boosted high-speed cache memory from Pentium II`s 512KB up to 2MB. Running at 450MHz, the chip was specifically designed for servers and workstations.

This month Intel released the Pentium III Xeon, upping the speed to 550MHz. Targeted at mid-range and higher-end servers, Internet and data intensive environments, Pentium III scales up to eight processors on a single server.

Scalability combined with low prices - the formula that has driven the PC market`s growth - is Intel`s strength in the server chip arena. Xeon II`s price tag is more than 10 times that of earlier generation Pentium II processors. However, at between $2 800 and $4 500, Xeon II still comes to the market with a price/performance advantage over comparable Unix chips, which can run from $5 000 to $6 000.

Buying a server should be a long-term investment, and server chips hold their value longer than their desktop counterparts. This is an important factor, says Andrew Fletcher, product manager for HP netservers and networking. "In addition to scalability and high availability, the investment protection the vendor can offer the customer with respect to future Intel products is becoming more of a necessity in the mid-range market."

While the Wintel machine has made a dent in the low-end Unix server market, the line between the Unix and Windows worlds is starting to blur at the mid-range level, with SCO`s UnixWare having made big steps with Unix on Intel.

In March SCO announced UnixWare 7 Data Centre Edition, the most advanced server operating system for volume. "SCO is delivering the power that volume Intel servers need to move into the data centre," says Ray Anderson, senior VP of marketing at SCO.

"SCO is completely Intel-based because of its scalability and reliability," adds Bette Kun, marketing manager at SCO SA. We are already seeing the move towards the mid-range Intel-based server with Intel giving stability and price performance over the higher-end servers. We are seeing more and more businesses adopting it in the mid-range server market."

This release was seen as a key milestone on the path to Monterey 64, a Unix operating system initiative led by IBM, SCO, Sequent, and most recently joined by Compaq. A high volume shrink-wrapped Unix operating system is being developed for Intel`s IA-64 processor - the long-awaited Merced.

Another interesting twist to Merced is that even Intel processor rival Sun has released a Solaris developer`s kit for Merced hoping to attract server vendors to run Solaris on the Merced chip. Intel in turn has agreed to develop a version of Merced optimised for Solaris.

Industry analysts predict that Pentium III will force non-Intel server vendors to cut prices on low-end systems. But Sun Microsystems` response is that Intel-based servers still have a long way to go to match Sun`s scalability - its server line currently runs from two to 64 processors.

Tony Bogatie, Compaq`s enterprise product manager for the Africa region, notes that "industry-standard servers do not provide the same levels of high availability as the more proprietary RISC/Unix-based systems, but they do provide a serious affordable alternative.

"We see customers deploying serious solutions on Intel-based platforms," he says. "Just look at what SAP is doing on NT. Other vendors such as PeopleSoft, Baan, JD Edwards and Citrix have applications that are designed to run on industry-standard operating systems."

Bogatie says the value of the Intel-based server market is that it is driven primarily by the fact that customers are looking for affordable server-based solutions in an "open market". This means that because hardware and software standards are open, there is immense adoption of the thousands of vendors and developers, and customers have the flexibility to choose.

HP`s Fletcher believes the Intel-based servers are rapidly maturing. "With improved performance and focus on mission-critical solutions there are more and more cases where these servers are being deployed in place of some high-end servers."

"Intel-based servers are well suited to handling large, mission-critical applications, provided corporates accept the need to build in redundancy to eliminate the risk of system downtime," notes Brian Bogaard, GM of Acer Africa.

Computer Configurations implements IT solutions running on both Intel and Sun servers. But how does the company decide which server option is the best for its customers?

"It depends what system the client is currently using," says Rob Hume, marketing director of Computer Configurations. "If it is Intel then we implement Intel solutions and vice versa. It therefore depends on what brand is used by the client. Obviously it is more cost-effective to implement the same brand that the client is currently using."

In addition, Hume says Sun technology generates more interest in the financial services market while Intel-based solutions attract more attention in the educational and industrial markets.

Some server vendors, such as Hewlett-Packard and Compaq, have more than one server platform in their range. Compaq has both Intel-based Proliant servers and AlphaServers. It is the level of scalability that decides the client`s choice, says Rob Schroenn, Compaq product manager for high performance servers. "We have clients who require the levels of scalability, high availability and 64-bit capability offered by AlphaServer, OpenVMS and Tru64 Unix. These systems provide price/performance levels that are coming close to those Intel-based systems. These requirements may be present or projected.

"On the other hand, we have clients whose requirements will never exceed the scalability and availability of the Proliant Intel-based systems, " explains Schroenn. "We promote the Proliant systems to these customers."

Complex server applications such as messaging, enterprise resource planning (ERP), online transaction processing, data modelling and software encryption have created demand for fast, high-performance servers. The growth of the Web server environment is particularly strong.

Jorge de Campos, marketing executive for TCM, an IBM AS/400 business partner, notes: "We see a move from a proprietary environment to a far more open environment, where servers will be able to run a lot more applications and turn into scalable Web server environments."

This scalable Web environment is where the Intel-based servers come into their own. Steve Nossel, Intel SA country manager, says the new streaming SIMD extensions of the Pentium III Xeon processor benefit many TCP/IP Internet and network-related technologies, as well as applications requiring an Internet interface, such as Web hosting, e-commerce, database and ERP.

The prompt shipment by Dell, Acer, Compaq, HP and IBM of first servers based on blazingly fast 550MHz Pentium III Xeon is a testament to their bullish expectations for Intel`s server platform. While industry research shows that this will not necessarily mean a victory over huge, non-Intel Unix environments, the new generation of Intel servers is reaching quite high into the enterprise.