HP India set to roll out Itanium-based systems

NEW DELHI: HP India announced the first portfolio of Intel Itanium

Processor-Family (IPF)-based systems, services and solutions in India.

Hewlett-Packard company, co-developer of the Intel Itanium Instruction Set

Architecture, offers early adopters and customers the freedom to choose their

operating system by supporting HP-UX, Microsoft Windows and Linux. This choice

provides customers with cost effectiveness, scalability, application

availability and interoperability required to meet their business needs.

HP's first Itanium-based systems include the HP Workstation i2000 with up to

2 processors, the HP Server rx4610 with up to 4 processors and the HP Server

rx9610 with up to 16 processors. These Itanium systems are available to Indian

customers now. HP is the first vendor to declare that processors from the

Itanium family will ultimately power its entire range of workstations and

servers.

HP-UX is also the only 64-bit UNIX system that provides compatibility to

customers' software applications as the transition from Reduced Instruction Set

Computing (RISC) to Itanium processor architecture. HP-UX is optimized for the

Itanium processor architecture. HP is the only system vendor providing a smooth

upgrade path to IPF without recompiling software applications. With IA-32 binary

compatibility,

HP Itanium servers will also be able to run existing Windows applications.

"In many ways, PA-RISC lives on in the IPF architecture. Because we

co-developed the Itanium family specifications with Intel, we have a unique

advantage in allowing a simple and easy migration to this futuristic

architecture," commented BCSO HP India vice president Ravi Aggarwal. HP

customers will also have data compatibility and therefore would not be required

to undergo the cumbersome data

migration.

"This will also ensure that the end-users will benefit from the same

breadth of applications and solutions available on the Itanium processor

platform that they enjoy today on other platforms," he added.

HP offers a broad range of services designed to make users transition to IPF

in a cost effective and simple manner. In this direction, it has announced a

host of Itanium porting and migration services, that include guidance to the

users, free assessment workshops, solutions delivery and on-line assistance

through 'HP Guru Service'.