HP claims the lead in high-end Unix field

Carly Fiorina, CEO of HP, claims the company's latest server is 'the most powerful Unix server available'.

Speaking at the launch in New York, she said the Superdome server is the result of two years spent talking to customers and is evidence of how technology and business are increasingly interlinked. Fiorina added it was at these 'intersections' between business processes and technology that HP would focus and on which future businesses would rely. The Superdome server uses up to 32 processors and 256 gigs of memory. It also allows what HP describes as 'utility pricing' - charging businesses for the computing power they use. Duane Zitzner, president of computing systems division at HP, said: "Customers don't have time for a traditional upgrade any more. We ship servers with extra processors - when you turn them on, you pay for them." Businesses can turn the processors on or off and only pay for the time they are used. This technology will be extended to HP's mid-range servers. The machine also allows partitioning - running different applications on the same machine. It also has 'virtual partitioning' so the partitions themselves can be divided.