IBM Tweaks Power Systems, Flex Systems Prices

October 8, 2012 Timothy Prickett Morgan

As part of last week’s Power Systems announcements, IBM tweaked a bunch of different prices in the Power Systems and Flex Systems lineup.

In announcement letter 312-113, Big Blue cut prices on disk drives in its PowerLinux 7R1 Linux-only machines, which already have artificially low prices compared to plain vanilla Power Systems 730 machines that can run AIX or IBM i in addition to Linux. I described the price differential that the PowerLinux machines enjoy here back in May, and the gap just got larger.

	Feature		Old	New	Percent
Type	Number	Description	Price	Price	Change
PowerLinux 7R1
8246	EL0P	600 GB 10K RPM SAS SFF Disk	$619	$589	-4.8%
8246	EL0Z	300 GB 15K RPM SAS SFF Disk	$735	$679	-7.6%
8246	EL02	300 GB 15K RPM SAS SFF Disk	$339	$309	-8.8%
8246	EL03	147 GB 15K RPM SAS SFF Disk	$389	$369	-5.1%
8246	EL1M	146 GB 15K RPM SAS SFF Disk	$389	$369	-5.1%
8246	EL1N	300 GB 10K RPM SAS SFF Disk	$339	$309	-8.8%
8246	EL1P	300 GB 10K RPM SAS SFF Disk	$735	$679	-7.6%
8246	EL1Q	600 GB 10K RPM SAS SFF Disk	$619	$589	-4.8%
8246	ELQM	Quantity 150 of #EL1M	$58,350	$55,350	-5.1%
8246	ELQN	Quantity 150 of #EL1N	$50,850	$46,350	-8.8%
8246	ELQP	Quantity 150 of #EL1P	$110,250	$101,850	-7.6%
8246	ELQQ	Quantity 150 of #EL1Q	$92,850	$88,350	-4.8%
Power 795
9119	EP2Q	100 Proc Day CoD AIX/Linux	$2,300	$2,000	-13.0%
9119	EP2R	100 Proc Day CoD IBM i	$18,500	$18,700	1.1%
9119	4704	100 Proc Day CoD AIX/Linux	$3,300	$2,000	-39.4%
9119	4709	1 Proc Day CoD	$33	$20	-39.4%
9119	4711	1 Proc Day CoD	$23	$20	-13.0%
9119	4712	100 Proc Day CoD IBM i	$19,400	$18,700	-3.6%
9119	4721	1 Proc Day CoD, IBM i	$194	$187	-3.6%
9119	4724	1 Proc Day CoD, IBM i	$185	$187	1.1%

IBM has also tweaked the capacity-on-demand pricing for its Power 795 servers running AIX/Linux or IBM i, slashing the price for cores you turn on for one day or 100 days when you configure them with AIX or Linux. IBM capacity-on-demand did not see a price cut per se, but IBM did normalize the price so that no matter what processor option you choose for the Power 795, it costs the same for a day or 100 days to activate a core. I am not sure why this is fair or desirable, but there it is.

In announcement letter 312-115, IBM tweaked the prices on the base Flex System chassis lowering some prices and raising others, as well as lowering disk and memory prices for the x240 Xeon E5-based server nodes and increasing some Xeon E5 processor prices. Here are the price changes:

	Feature		Old	New	Percent
Type	Number	Description	Price	Price	Change
7955	01M	Flex System Manager	$4,762	$6,762	42.0%
7955	1771	200 GB 1.8-Inch SATA SSD	$3,199	$2,199	-31.3%
7893	3596	Port Upgrade for #3593 Switch	$9,899	$10,999	11.1%
7863	3766	600 GB 10K RPM SAS SFF Disk	$619	$589	-4.8%
7863	EEM5	8 GB, 1600 MHz LP RDIMM	$258	$270	4.7%
7863	EEM6	32 GB, 1333 MHz LP RDIMM	$1,558	$998	-35.9%
7863	EEM7	64 GB, 1067 MHz LP RDIMM	$4,998	$3,998	-20.0%
7863	EEM8	64 GB, 1333 MHz LP RDIMM	$8,998	$4,198	-53.3%
7863	EEM9	16 GB, 1600 MHz LP RDIMM	$438	$398	-9.1%
7863	EHD1	146 GB 15K RPM SAS SFF Disk	$389	$369	-5.1%
7863	EHD3	200 GB SAS SFF SSD	$3,399	$2,199	-35.3%
7863	EHD4	900 GB 10K RPM SAS SFF Disk	$999	$899	-10.0%
7863	EHD5	300 GB 15K RPM SAS SFF Disk	$735	$679	-7.6%
7863	EM17	16 GB, 1333 MHz LP RDIMM	$358	$338	-5.6%
7863	EM33	32 GB, 1333 MHz LP RDIMM	$1,298	$918	-29.3%
7863	EEMB	32 GB, 1600 MHz LP RDIMM	$998	$878	-12.0%
7863	EEMC	8 GB, 1600 MHz LP RDIMM	$258	$270	4.7%
7863	EP3T	8-Core Xeon E5-2648L, 1.8 GHz	$2,069	$2,389	15.5%
7863	EP3U	8-Core Xeon E5-2648L, 1.8 GHz	$2,069	$2,389	15.5%
7863	EP3V	8-Core Xeon E5-2658, 2.1 GHz	$2,019	$2,389	18.3%
7863	EP3W	8-Core Xeon E5-2658, 2.1 GHz	$2,019	$2,389	18.3%

As you can see from the table above, IBM is charging quite a bit more for the Flex System Manager that is at the heart of PureSystems iron, but has radically slashed the cost of some flash and main memory options for the box. The system is a radically new design, and IBM is no doubt trying to position again new Xeon E5 iron from Cisco Systems, Hewlett-Packard, and Dell. You’ll notice a lack of price cuts for Power Systems server nodes in the PureSystems lineup in this announcement–even though the title says “Price change(s): IBM Power Systems selected model and features.”

Obviously, if the Xeon-E5 x240 nodes are getting some love, I think the Power7 p260 and p460 nodes should, too.

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