Itanium is a discontinued family of 64-bit Intel microprocessors that implement the Intel Itanium architecture. The Itanium architecture originated at Hewlett-Packard (HP), and was later jointly developed by HP and Intel. Launched in June 2001, Intel initially marketed the processors for enterprise servers and high-performance computing systems. In the concept phase, engineers said "we could run circles around PowerPC...we could kill the x86." Early predictions were that IA-64 would expand to the lower-end servers, supplanting Xeon, and eventually penetrate into the personal computers, eventually to supplant reduced instruction set computing (RISC) and complex instruction set computing (CISC) architectures for all general-purpose applications.
Sun Microsystems, Inc. was an American technology company that sold computers, computer components, software, and information technology services and created the Java programming language, the Solaris operating system, ZFS, the Network File System (NFS), and SPARC microprocessors. Sun contributed significantly to the evolution of several key computing technologies, among them Unix, RISC processors, thin client computing, and virtualized computing. Notable Sun acquisitions include Cray Business Systems Division, Storagetek, and Innotek GmbH, creators of VirtualBox. Sun was founded on February 24, 1982. At its height, the Sun headquarters were in Santa Clara, California, on the former west campus of the Agnews Developmental Center.
SPARC is a reduced instruction set computer (RISC) instruction set architecture originally developed by Sun Microsystems. Its design was strongly influenced by the experimental Berkeley RISC system developed in the early 1980s. First developed in 1986 and released in 1987, SPARC was one of the most successful early commercial RISC systems, and its success led to the introduction of similar RISC designs from many vendors through the 1980s and 1990s.
Solaris is a proprietary Unix operating system originally developed by Sun Microsystems. After the Sun acquisition by Oracle in 2010, it was renamed Oracle Solaris.
In computer architecture, 64-bit integers, memory addresses, or other data units are those that are 64 bits wide. Also, 64-bit central processing units (CPU) and arithmetic logic units (ALU) are those that are based on processor registers, address buses, or data buses of that size. A computer that uses such a processor is a 64-bit computer.
x86-64 is a 64-bit version of the x86 instruction set, first announced in 1999. It introduced two new modes of operation, 64-bit mode and compatibility mode, along with a new 4-level paging mode.
Xeon is a brand of x86 microprocessors designed, manufactured, and marketed by Intel, targeted at the non-consumer workstation, server, and embedded markets. It was introduced in June 1998. Xeon processors are based on the same architecture as regular desktop-grade CPUs, but have advanced features such as support for error correction code (ECC) memory, higher core counts, more PCI Express lanes, support for larger amounts of RAM, larger cache memory and extra provision for enterprise-grade reliability, availability and serviceability (RAS) features responsible for handling hardware exceptions through the Machine Check Architecture (MCA). They are often capable of safely continuing execution where a normal processor cannot due to these extra RAS features, depending on the type and severity of the machine-check exception (MCE). Some also support multi-socket systems with two, four, or eight sockets through use of the Ultra Path Interconnect (UPI) bus, which replaced the older QuickPath Interconnect (QPI) bus.
Altix is a line of server computers and supercomputers produced by Silicon Graphics, based on Intel processors. It succeeded the MIPS/IRIX-based Origin 3000 servers.
The Sun Ultra series is a discontinued line of workstation and server computers developed and sold by Sun Microsystems, comprising two distinct generations. The original line was introduced in 1995 and discontinued in 2001. This generation was partially replaced by the Sun Blade in 2000 and that line was in itself replaced by the Sun Java Workstation—an AMD Opteron system—in 2004. In sync with the transition to x86-64-architecture processors, in 2005 the Ultra brand was later revived with the launch of the Ultra 20 and Ultra 40, albeit to some confusion, since they were no longer based on UltraSPARC processors.
Sun Microsystems' UltraSPARC T1 microprocessor, known until its 14 November 2005 announcement by its development codename "Niagara", is a multithreading, multicore CPU. Designed to lower the energy consumption of server computers, the CPU typically uses 72 W of power at 1.4 GHz.
Sun-4 is a series of Unix workstations and servers produced by Sun Microsystems, launched in 1987. The original Sun-4 series were VMEbus-based systems similar to the earlier Sun-3 series, but employing microprocessors based on Sun's own SPARC V7 RISC architecture in place of the 68k family processors of previous Sun models.
Sun Microsystems' UltraSPARC T2 microprocessor is a multithreading, multi-core CPU. It is a member of the SPARC family, and the successor to the UltraSPARC T1. The chip is sometimes referred to by its codename, Niagara 2. Sun started selling servers with the T2 processor in October 2007.
SunPCi is a series of single-board computers with a connector that effectively allows a PC motherboard to be fitted in Sun Microsystems SPARC-based workstations based on the PCI architecture adding the capability for the workstation to act as a 'IBM PC compatible' computer. The Sun PCi cards included an x86 processor, RAM, expansion ports, and an onboard graphics controller, allowing a complete Wintel operating environment on a Solaris system. The SunPCi software running on Solaris emulates the disk drives that contain the PC filesystem. The PC software running on the embedded hardware is displayed in an X window on the host desktop; there is also a connector on the edge of the board that can optionally be used to connect a PC monitor.
Logical Domains is the server virtualization and partitioning technology for SPARC V9 processors. It was first released by Sun Microsystems in April 2007. After the Oracle acquisition of Sun in January 2010, the product has been re-branded as Oracle VM Server for SPARC from version 2.0 onwards.
The SPARC Enterprise series is a range of UNIX server computers based on the SPARC V9 architecture. It was co-developed by Sun Microsystems and Fujitsu, announced on June 1, 2004, and introduced in 2007. They were marketed and sold by Sun Microsystems, Fujitsu, and Fujitsu Siemens Computers under the common brand of "SPARC Enterprise", superseding Sun's Sun Fire and Fujitsu's PRIMEPOWER server product lines. Codename is APL.
Sun Blade is a line of blade server computer systems sold by Sun Microsystems from 2006 onwards.
PRIMERGY is Fujitsu's brand name for x86-architecture designed servers. The brand name PRIMERGY represents a range of servers from single-socket over dual-socket to quad-socket systems. Eight socket systems are branded differently with "PRIMEQUEST", whereas Fujitsu servers in the UNIX/Mainframe world, also known as SPARC systems, are named "Fujitsu M10" and mainframes "BS2000."
The SPARC T-series family of RISC processors and server computers, based on the SPARC V9 architecture, was originally developed by Sun Microsystems, and later by Oracle Corporation after its acquisition of Sun. Its distinguishing feature from earlier SPARC iterations is the introduction of chip multithreading (CMT) technology, a multithreading, multicore design intended to drive greater processor utilization at lower power consumption.
