The closest they will come is the developer discount program which either gives you a low lease rate or a 50% discount on purchase. We participate in the lease option, which, given the hardware changes over the past few years, ends up being a smart move. We have a older 270 that we use in "production" and the 520 is the developer "bleeding edge" box we run the latest versions on. The dilemma at the moment is the licensing changes that started with the last round of hardware changes. The user based pricing makes things "interesting" going forward. We may just buy out the lease in the 520 Power5+ we have and use it for a few more years as our "production" box and dump the 270. The new JS21 blade will be our chance to see how the user based pricing works (especially the "named user" licensing).

But, this is probably a better discussion for Midrange than the Web list.

Pete


Aaron Bartell wrote:
Simple, they would put artificial limits on the hardware and software.
For example, only allow 2GB of memory, only two HD's, only two
non-system user profiles, limit the amount of total HD space to 35GB,
and I am sure there are many more ways to creativly cripple it for
'customers' but not hobbyists.

Then once the hobbyist outgrows their system they simply write out a
check to "open up" the system.

Thoughts?
Aaron Bartell
http://mowyourlawn.com





On 4/9/08, Trevor Perry <trevor@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Aaron,

If the $3K version was for a developer use, how would IBM prevent an actual
'customer' from getting the developer box and using it for, say...
production?

In other words, how does IBM distinguish between giving a discount to the
developers who would use it to build new apps, vs. the end-customers who
would buy enough of the apps+servers to make IBM the profit they need to be
able to afford selling the $3K version to us?

Trevor


On 4/9/08 11:34 PM, "Aaron Bartell" <aaronbartell@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

Hi Pete,

Yeah, I was expecting to need a newer base system to cash in on the
new pricing. Anybody know what it costs for a hard drive and stick of
memory in these new systems? When they announced the machines I went
out to the website and added one to my "shopping basket" and came up
with a price of $12k total for what I needed (entry level "Express").
Wouldn't it rock if they came up with a way to have a "hobbyist"
version where you could get the hardware and "IBM i" for $3k? I think
we would see a lot more people having them in their basements and thus
a lot more usage of the platform vs. decline.

Aaron Bartell
http://mowyourlawn.com
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