> Mainframes are unbelievably powerful, feature-full, and cost-effective.
Having run IBM's own software (WAS and WAS derivatives) on both x86 and IFL, and found the same applications with the same workloads having a ratio of 1.5-2 x86:1 IFL, while the IFL itself is 1-2 orders of magnitude more expensive than an x86 core, that zVM is an order of magnitude more expensive than VMWare's hypervisors, that memory is two orders of magnitude more expensive than x86... well. I think you're long on the evangelism and short on the reality.
Having run IBM's own software (WAS and WAS derivatives) on both x86 and IFL, and found the same applications with the same workloads having a ratio of 1.5-2 x86:1 IFL, while the IFL itself is 1-2 orders of magnitude more expensive than an x86 core, that zVM is an order of magnitude more expensive than VMWare's hypervisors, that memory is two orders of magnitude more expensive than x86... well. I think you're long on the evangelism and short on the reality.