Apple targets Linux, Windows

When the Virginia Polytechnic and State University decided earlier this year that it wanted to deploy a supercomputer - and do it on a university budget - it, not surprisingly, turned to Dell. The idea was to cluster hundreds of Dell's low-cost, Intel-based boxes to create a system that could crunch numbers like a supercomputer, but without the hefty price tag.

But when it was about to sign the contract for hundreds of Dell's Itanium 2-based boxes, the server maker balked and backed out of the deal. Virginia Tech turned to Advanced Micro Devices, HP, IBM, Intel and Sun, but ultimately settled on a vendor that might come as a surprise to some network executives: Apple.

Today, the Terascale Cluster at Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, Va., consists of 1,100 of Apple's new 64-bit Power Mac G5 computers and is expected to be ranked as one of the fastest supercomputers on the planet. The price, which includes Mellanox Technologies InfiniBand networking and Cisco Gigabit Ethernet switches, was $5.2 million, compared with as much as $12 million that other vendors quoted.

"Basically, when we had just about given up hope, Apple announced the G5. The G5 has the IBM PowerPC 970 chip. That was our dream chip," says Kevin Shinpaugh, associate director of the Virginia Tech Terascale Facility. "It's inexpensive, it's 64-bit, it has fuse multiply-add, and it also has a very high clock rate."

Apple rolled out the G5 in June and more recently unveiled the latest iteration of its Unix-based operating system, Mac OS X 10.3, nicknamed Panther. Apple executives say they hope this updated operating system, which makes it easier to integrate Macs with existing Windows and Linux machines, along with higher performing hardware such as the G5, will help Apple gain more traction in enterprise data centers.

Today, Apple doesn't even make the list when analyst firms break out operating system market share for server operating environments. It falls in the "other" category for Unix systems, which accounted for 11% of the market in 2002, according to IDC. Meanwhile, Windows captured 55% of the market and paid shipments of Linux, which analysts say is the fastest-growing operating system, held 23% of the market.

Apple says it hopes to take a bigger bite of operating system market share by offering an alternative based on open standards that can fit into existing Windows, Linux or Unix environments. A plus for Apple is its pricing. Unlike Microsoft, which licenses per user, Apple sells Panther for just less than $1,000 for unlimited users. A 10-client license is $500.

Panther, which Apple says includes 150 new features, now offers tighter integration with Windows environments by using Samba 3, the latest version of an open source technology that enables transparent integration between Windows and Macs.

Panther also includes JBoss, the open source Java-based application server, so that any Java-based applications can run on the Mac systems. And a new Server Admin tool provides better management, including an automation capability that makes setting up a server rack as easy as deploying one server, says Tom Goguen, director of product marketing for server software for Apple. Enhanced directory and authentications services in Apple's Open Directory make linking to existing systems, such as Microsoft's Active Directory easier, too, he says.

"Where Apple is heading is the enterprise," says Joe Wilcox, a senior analyst at Jupiter Research. "With this release of OS X 10, there is improved support for Microsoft's Active Directory and new support for Exchange Server, so it's a very Windows-friendly release. At the same time, Apple has also bolstered support for Linux."

Because the operating system is based on BSD Unix, it has long been friendly to the Unix environment. However, in the past, Apple customers running Macs would transition to Unix machines when they wanted to run big applications.

"The Macs could only take them so far because of the capabilities of the operating system," Wilcox says. "There are a lot of installations that have Unix servers running alongside Macs. So now that everything is based on Unix at the core Apple is hoping to convert everything over to Macs."

At Virginia Tech, Shinpaugh is looking forward to deploying the new Panther operating system to take advantage of the G5's 64-bit capabilities. He also likes the enhanced manageability features in the new operating system, such as for handling Web servers and remote sites.

Virginia Tech set up its homegrown cluster itself with the help of dozens of students, working for nothing but pizza.

"What Virginia Tech did speaks volumes about the power of the Unix-based operating system, the price performance and the efforts we've put in to make things easy," Apple's Goguen says.