IBM is beefing up its server line-up with the first blades based on its Power7 processor, the company announced Tuesday. It is also introducing a new, low-end edition of its AIX operating system for smaller businesses and enterprises doing consolidation projects.

With a promise of better performance, lower total cost of ownership, and optimum features for virtualization, IT solutions vendor IBM today announced the launch of its new IBM Power7 system servers, which builds on the successes of its predecessor.

The announcement of high-end servers by IBM and Hewlett-Packard this week won't halt declining Unix server sales as the onslaught of x86 servers continues, analysts said on Tuesday.

IBM on Monday launched its latest Power7 processor, which adds more cores and improved multithreading capabilities to boost the performance of servers requiring high up time.

Intel on Tuesday said it has started shipping its new Itanium processor codenamed Tukwila, after multiple delays and development problems stalled its release for years.

IBM disclosed the plans at a time when server sales among all vendors have taken a bruising during the economic downturn, and IBM is no exception. In a third quarter earnings call yesterday, said Mark Loughridge, IBM's chief financial officer, said that the company's third quarter mainframe revenue declined by 26 per cent from the year-earlier period.

Fujitsu aims to deliver by early 2011 a 10-petaflop supercomputer, which would be almost 10 times more powerful than today's fastest system.