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Server Hardware

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Mainframe

A term originally referring to the cabinet containing the central processor unit or "main frame" of a room-filling Stone Age batch machine.

After the emergence of smaller "minicomputer" designs in the early 1970s, the traditional big iron machines were described as "mainframe computers" and eventually just as mainframes.

The term carries the connotation of a machine designed for batch rather than interactive use, though possibly with an interactive time-sharing operating system retrofitted onto it; it is especially used of machines built by IBM, Unisys and the other great dinosaurs surviving from computing's Stone Age.

It has been common wisdom among hackers since the late 1980s that the mainframe architectural tradition is essentially dead (outside of the tiny market for number crunching supercomputers), having been swamped by the recent huge advances in integrated circuit technology and low-cost personal computing.

Supporters claim that mainframes still house 90% of the data major businesses rely on for mission-critical applications, attributing this to their superior performance, reliability, scalability, and security compared to microprocessors.

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Minicomputer

A computer built between about 1963 and 1987, smaller and less powerful than a mainframe, typically about the size and shape of a wardrobe, mounted in a single tall

rack. Their low cost made them suitable for a wide variety of applications

such as industrial control, where a small, dedicated computer which is permanently assigned to one application, is needed.

In recent years, improvements in device technology have resulted in minicomputers which are comparable in performance to large second generation computers and greatly exceed the performance of first generation computers.

DEC's PDP-1 was the first minicomputer and their PDP-11 was the most successful, closely followed (in both time and success) by the VAX (which DEC called a "super minicomputer").

Another early minicomputer was the LINC developed at MIT in 1963.

Other minicomputers were the AS/400, the PRIME series, the AP-3, Olivetti's Audit 7 and the Interdata 8/32.

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MinicomputerAS400 (i-Series)

An IBM minicomputer for small business and departmental users, released in 1988 and still in production in October 1998.

Features include a menu-driven interface, multi-user support, terminals that are (in the grand IBM tradition) incompatible with anything else including the IBM 3270 series, and an extensive library-based operating system.

The machine survives because its API layer allows the operating system and application programs to take advantage of advances in hardware without recompilation and which means that a complete system that costs $9000 runs the exact same operating system and software as a $2 million system. There is a 64-bit RISC processor operating system implementation.

Programming languages include RPG, assembly language, C, COBOL, SQL, BASIC, and REXX. Several CASE tools are available: Synon, AS/SET, Lansa

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AS400(i-Series)

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UNIX

/yoo'niks/ (Or "UNIX", in the authors' words, "A weak pun on Multics") Plural "Unices". An interactive time-sharing operating system invented in 1969

by Ken Thompson after Bell Labs left the Multics project. Dennis Ritchie, the inventor of C, is considered a co-author of

the system. The turning point in Unix's history came when it was

reimplemented almost entirely in C during 1972 - 1974, making it the first source-portable OS. Unix subsequently underwent mutations and expansions at

the hands of many different people, resulting in a uniquely flexible and developer-friendly environment.

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UNIX

By 1991, Unix had become the most widely used multi-user general-purpose operating system in the world. Many people consider this the most important victory yet of

hackerdom over industry opposition Unix is now offered by many manufacturers and is the

subject of an international standardisation effort. Unix-like operating systems include AIX, A/UX, BSD, Debian,

FreeBSD, GNU, HP-UX, Linux, NetBSD, NEXTSTEP, OpenBSD, OPENSTEP, OSF, POSIX, RISCiX, Solaris, SunOS, System V, Ultrix, USG Unix, Version 7, Xenix.

"Unix" or "UNIX"? Both seem roughly equally popular, perhaps with a historical

bias toward the latter. "UNIX" is a registered trademark of The Open Group.

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Unix servers

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IBM PC

The IBM PC™ (Personal Computer), was the original version and progenitor of the IBM PC compatible hardware platform.

It was introduced on August 11, 1981.IBM lost control of the platform in the

1990s (EISA bus)

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WINTEL

The phrase "personal computer" was common currency before 1981, and was used as early as 1972 to characterize Xerox PARC's Alto. However, due to the success of the IBM PC, what had been a generic term came to mean specifically a microcomputer compatible with IBM's specification.

During the second quarter of 2005, the Chinese Lenovo Group secured the rights to produce IBM branded personal computers. This move reflects IBM's present lack of interest in the personal computer in favor of the server/mainframe markets, as well as providing business consulting and IT services markets.

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WINTEL hardware

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LINUX hardware

LINUX runs on PC hardware (INTEL)SUN SPARC (SOLARIS)zSeries (mainframe)…