3 ms·
>The cost is very high - when I looked, 1 million per year is the baby version with only 1 CPU enabled and no license to run the cryptographic accelerator and l
by ch_123 7y ago
>The cost is very high - when I looked, 1 million per year is the baby version with only 1 CPU enabled and no license to run the cryptographic accelerator and limits on software, etc.
At one point, IBM was selling base-level mainframes for $75,000 (see https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2013/07/ibm-unveils-new-mainframe-for-the-rest-of-us/ https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2013/07/ibm-u...)
It is true though that a 'realistic' configuration is likely to cost north of $1 million, and that none of these numbers include the price of the software.
- StrangeDoctor 7y agoIt’s the support contract that’s the real cost.
- rodgerd 7y agoA standard IBM "gotcha" is to offer deep discounts and charge the 20% p.a. maint cost on the list price - e.g. "We'll give you this hardware for $1." then a year later "So sorry the maint is 3 x $250k x 0.2 = $150k p.a.". Another is that the software and hardware designed to turn a baby system into anything useful is astonishingly expensive to people not used to dealing with this end of the market. Enjoy finding that your hypervisor is licensed at 5 figures per core, and that your cores are six figures a pop.