RE: New i, iSeries, AS/400 Suggestions

You will have to look at your twinax, tape drive, and console issues and
decide yourself. I don't see those as big issues but I'm sure your shop
will feel differently.

Pricing will vary but while the M15's usually will come in at a higher
acquisition cost I think you will find that the M15's will be about 10%
to 15% better in price performance compared to 515's. You are paying
more but also getting more. In my world we always end up using the more
so I don't think of it as being processor rich.

We just selected two M15's instead of 515's but we have no twinax, the
internal LTO4's saved our butts, and we were planning on a HMC anyway.
The lease rates were more favorable for the M15's so if you are thinking
of leasing keep that in mind.

Michael Crump

Manager, Computing Services
Saint-Gobain Containers, Inc.
1509 S. Macedonia Ave.
Muncie, IN 47302
765.741.7696
765.741.7012 f

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-----Original Message-----
From: midrange-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:midrange-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Konrad Underkofler
Sent: Thursday, May 15, 2008 8:52 AM
To: midrange-l@xxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: New i, iSeries, AS/400 Suggestions

We are looking at replacing our nice IBM 270 with a new system. Our
needs are low end (relatively) and this will probably be our last IBM
box but we do want to maximize our HA and DR abilities without adding
the complexity of a CBU box and software. In short we need a good quick
backup and restore. We do have legacy printers, 3 twinax line printers
and 2 IPDS IBM 4400 label printers. Pricing on the PSF/400 feature
seems weird at the P05 tier so the 4400's probably have to go but we are
comfortable with Zebra printers as a replacement. We would like to keep
the twinax printers if possible since they are workhorses with a fan
base.

Currently it looks like the 515 is a better deal than the new M15 Power
6 machine. We can get a two processor 515 with 8 drives for not much
more than the single processor M15 with 6 drives. The 515 also allows
us to attach a LTO4 drive externally although I now see we can add an
internal LTO4 to the M15. Moving up on the Power 6 models explodes cost
pretty rapidly so the M15 appears to be the only practical choice in
that area. Unfortunately we have been told the last date to order the
515 is June 20th so we need to make a decision soon. Not sure why IBM
is discontinuing a machine that is far more appealing to the existing
AS/400 base than the new models, both models are not very expandable but
the M15 has some real limitations (the twinax issue).

Finally it appears that we need v5r4 since our software vendor is legacy
with vague plans on supporting v6r1.

Any suggestions or thoughts?

Thanks for any input!

Konrad





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