'Best ever' Windows server takes on Unix

A $4.6m NEC server using Microsoft Windows has grabbed high marks in a closely watched performance ranking traditionally dominated by machines running the Unix operating system.

The fifth-place ranking on the Transaction Performance Council's TPC-C speed test is an important step in Microsoft's years-long struggle to have its software used not only on PCs and low-end networked "server" computers, but also on high-end machines. Such servers often handle vital corporate computing tasks, such as tracking inventory or managing bank accounts.

Expensive, high-end servers typically come with higher profit margins and often include sales of services and software. But these servers, sold by companies such as Sun, IBM and Hewlett Packard, usually run the Unix operating system, not Windows.

NEC dented that Unix dominance with its $4.6m TX7/i9510 system using 32 of Intel's new Itanium 2 processors. While the price tag might sound steep, it's a bargain compared with the top-ranked Fujitsu PrimePower 2000 server. This gargantuan Unix server comes with 128 processors and a $12 million price tag--and a 50 percent better score than the NEC machine.

The NEC system is available running Linux or HP-UX, HP's version of Unix. The version running Windows .Net Server 2003 Datacenter Edition will be available by Dec. 31, NEC said.

NEC demonstrated the 32-processor server Monday at the Intel Developer Forum in San Jose, but using a system powered by the next-generation Madison processors Intel plans to release in 2003. The Madison models are similar to their Itanium 2 "McKinley" predecessors, but will run at a higher clock speed and incorporate more high-speed "cache" memory for better overall performance.

The TPC-C test gauges server performance by simulating numerous people placing orders and performing other inventory transactions that take place on a database server.

Though Microsoft has done well on "clustered" TPC-C tests that spread a database across several servers, that configuration is rarely used in the real world, and the "non-clustered" result is more closely monitored. In this category, Unix servers have long dominated.

The NEC system posted a TPC-C score of 309,000.

The result nearly doubles the previous top score for a non-clustered Windows server, a Unisys ES7000 server with 32 Intel Xeon processors.

Stephen Shankland writes for News.com