Eleven years after Lenovo acquired IBM’s x86 server biz, profits are still elusive Lenovo has again said its enterprise hardware business is on the cusp of becoming consistently profitable, despite the division again posting a loss after massive revenue growth. The Chinese hardware champ today posted $20.5 billion of revenue for its second quarter, a 15 percent year-over-year improvement. Profit fell one …
And the best way to do that is make it optional instead of ramming it into everything you can possibly think of. Give users a simple option to turn off all this AI crap if they don't want it (they never bloody well asked for it in the first place) and then leave them alone. And why should I have to pay more for a laptop or server because it has an AI chip inside when I don't want it, don't trust it and will actively avoid trying to use it?
The best way to do that is just to use it for situations where it's usable; oh, and don't wang on about it.
Apple did this... they added ML processors to their CPUs years ago, started using it for things like on device photo searching. It works well, you can search for stuff quite naturally on the iPhone and it does a good job.
It's using ML behind the scenes, but other than the yearly keynote they didn't scream 'AI' at you. It used the technologies, but didn't say 'Search with AI' or anything twee like that.
This was a good use of AI.
Fast forward a couple of years, and Apple is getting dinged by the industry for their slow adoption of AI... despite them using it for years.. properly.
So now, like with everything else, it's front and center and fucking annoying.
But it's okay, in 5 or 10 years you won't really know or care what things you use are using 'AI' behind the scenes as we'll've found the good use cases and ditched the bad ones. Then it just becomes another tool and we can all start moaning about whatever the next fad is.
(Because we all know; despite those lying comics; it won't be jetpacks.... it's never jetpacks... :( )
>> Fast forward a couple of years, and Apple is getting dinged by the industry for their slow adoption of AI... despite them using it for years.. properly.
Fanboy? Apple AI is utterly useless. Don't take my word for it, there are numerous reviews about it. A sample: https://medium.com/@jeremy_burns/why-is-apples-ai-so-bad-siri-apple-intelligence-and-the-frustrating-reality-dc91c35bfc2e.
Exactly. IBM isn't stupid, whatever else it may be.
Problem: ThinkPad future profitability looks terrible?
Solution: Sell the ThinkPad brand to China.
Problem: x86 server future profitability looks terrible?
Solution: Sell the x86 server line to the same idiots in China.
I used to be a qualified instructor for the original generation of IBM PC servers, eg Server 310, Server 500, Server 750 etc. They were very modular: MCA bus with add-in Pentium processor riser cards (up to 6 on the 750), LAN card etc. The 320 mobo also had two PCI slots for MCA-haters. Plus hot-swap hard drives (die-hard Big Blue fans called them DASD (Direct Access Storage Device) on a backplane. Up to 8 x 32 MB SIMMs, (yep, 32 MB, still available for $150.) The 500 box could also be configured with a System/390 processor. No screwdriver needed for normal servicing - blue plastic clips everywhere. But no hot-swap power supply. Somehow slightly cheap-looking compared to eg a PS2 Model 80. Woe betide if you didn't have the right Reference Diskette.
! also taught Netware 3.12 on Compaq PC servers (eg SystemPro with 2 x i486's and 8 x IDE hot-plug HDDs on a custom RAID card) with EISA bus which were infinitely better. Still got one in the garage. On the later models you could even hot-swap individual cards by turning off the power to any slot. Compaq had a excellent relationship with their customers and service agents. Beautifully-produced service manuals. Totally honest admission of every fault in a Service Advisory, up to and including free replacement of parts that hadn't failed yet. Such a pity they got swallowed in a thoroughly ill-advised takeover with Hewlett-Packard for $25 billion. RIP.
Links: https://www.ardent-tool.com/systems/pc_servers.html
https://www.computermuseum.org.uk/ (click List by make)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compaq_SystemPro
https://www.zdnet.com/article/worst-tech-mergers-and-acquisitions-hp-and-compaq/
AFAICT IBM has started quietly selling x86 servers again, though just as part of larger solutions. Where I work, we've been through 3 generations of their ESS/SSS GPFS-in-a-box product. The first generation was all Power based servers, the second was a roughly equal mix of Power and AMD, and the latest generation is all AMD.
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