Business desktops are a narrow, narrow margin business; they are almost a commodity. You have to be very efficient in order to make money selling desktops.
Particularly with this kind of niche, this isn't really so much about the box, it's about channels and go-to-market. It's about setting up distribution and supply partners more than it is about the right box.
Microsoft is going to be very late to the game and will need to overcome a presumption that it will favor Windows.
Microsoft has made a few unsuccessful attempts to become a key player in the supercomputer market but the company could be in a better position for success this time.
Microsoft has built its business on working with third party software vendors and wants to leverage that expertise to the supercomputing arena.
Michael Dell likes to periodically send messages to Intel that Dell does have the option of introducing AMD.
I see this as fine-tuning more than changing direction. Obviously, they're struggling financially, but in general this is a small number of people in the scope of things at Sun.
Sun has given a speed boost to its installed base as the company focuses on x64 systems and the forthcoming Niagara processor,
People have tried a lot of special purpose processing devices over the years and, with the exceptions of graphics units and arguably floating point units, general purpose processors have always won out in the end.
It's hard to see the Itanium Solutions Alliance accomplishing anything major that the billions already spent by HP, Intel, and the rest haven't. You don't see an x86 Solutions Alliance.