Wow, thanks for taking the time to respond! :) And now I get it: RAM emulation is not 100% stable due to the fact that application architecture simply isn't op

Wow, thanks for taking the time to respond! :) And now I get it: RAM emulation is not 100% stable due to the fact that application architecture simply isn't optimized at all to handle the interfaces yet, as opposed to flaky hardware (my initial arguably logical assumption). The article could have made that a little plainer, thanks for clearing that up. And thanks for dropping those performance figures; if there was an ELI5-sized soundbite explaining the rationale behind this card, that would be it. ( http://reddit.com/r/ExplainLikeImFive http://reddit.com/r/ExplainLikeImFive (ELI5) explains complex subjects using accessible, respectful simplifications. If I may say so, your explanation fits precisely into that category. :P) It's sad there's nothing like this for x86, but I wouldn't be too surprised if it were deemed too difficult to support an I/O path as performant as this without uncomfortable architectural changes. On that note, POWER8 is still at the point where it has the chance to lock in a future-proof architectural design, and hopefully it takes full advantage of that. My mention of ATX was simply a reference to "it doesn't need to be tiny or cool, it just needs to exist," but it appears the board you linked is currently the only product with any sort of vague open market presence. I definitely look forward to more accessible POWER architecture products in the future. :D Finally, thanks heaps for the PTOpenLab link! I'm still figuring out their points system and how that translates to daily usage allowance, but this looks incredibly cool. It's places like this that are laying the groundwork :)