[Info-vax] Xeon E7v3 and POWER8

[Stephen Hoffman]

Two of your faster server processor choices at present, the Intel Xeon 
E7 8800 v3 and IBM POWER8:

http://anandtech.com/print/9193/the-xeon-e78800-v3-review

(Interestingly, while Anandtech was hopeful for the future of the 
POWER8 design and for lower prices, they couldn't get access to a 
POWER8 box.)

Performance-competitive high-end high-volume chips are expensive, and 
performance-competitive and lower-volume high-end chips are really 
expensive.

Getting ~94% of the high-end four+ socket market segment and ~98% of 
the whole server market means you can keep your fabs busy and your 
new-product development teams funded, and it's a much bigger target for 
the software folks.

As for OpenVMS, it'll be interesting to see what VSI can manage with 
OpenVMS on x86-64, and whatever replaces this Intel Xeon server 
processor for the ~2018-to-2020 era, or whenever the OpenVMS bits 
become available for x86-64.

-- 
Pure Personal Opinion | HoffmanLabs LLC