Dell launches low-priced server for small business

NEW YORK: Dell Computer Corp. on Monday launched a more powerful computer

aimed at small and medium businesses, a market for which its low-price,

Intel-microprocessor based computers have appeal.

Dell, which became the No. 1 maker of personal computers this year by waging

an aggressive price war, said that it is shipping a $1,400 computer server based

on a Pentium III 1.13 gigahertz, or 1.13 billion cycles per second, processor

made by Intel Corp.

Dell stripped off some of the more expensive technology on its higher-end

$2,500 server but left some of the power and memory features of that model, Dell

product planning manager Mike Symba said.

That makes the new PowerEdge 1500SC attractive to companies for whom a

mission critical application is keeping its e-mail or Web site online, he said,

but who don't really need some of the advanced technologies of the next higher

version.

"We changed our thinking around that mission critical doesn't

necessarily need to mean very advanced technologies," Symba said. Austin,

Texas-based Dell saw its US unit sales of servers increase in the third quarter

by 10 per cent from the previous year even as revenues declined, according to

research firm Gartner Dataquest.

Dell, which only makes commodity servers based on Intel chips, said its least

expensive server lists for $599. That server doesn't have the ability to run on

two microprocessors, which is an option for the new server, Dell said.

(C) Reuters Limited.