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I ran into an AS400 a week ago on a job, box the size of your average PC, second hand (refurbished) cost: $125000...

That's a good markup, and it doesn't seem to do anything that a regular rack mounted intel box couldn't do. It probably has some reserve in terms of IO and reliability but for the spot where it's sitting it is total overkill (ancient ERP system only running on that hardware).

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The AS/400 is completely different hardware and software. I don't mean that it just a reimplementation of what you are used to, but rather alien to what you are used to. It is designed to be a business system, and an evolution of the System 32/36/38.

I recommend Frank Soltis' books about it, although they are very expensive. For example an earlier edition is http://www.amazon.com/Inside-As-400-Frank-Soltis/dp/18824191...

As an example there is extreme backwards compatibility, pervasive database, single address space (a different meaning of virtual memory than you are used to), sharing, tagged and protected pointers, clustering etc.

Thank you! I've worked with some pretty weird hardware in the past so I think I'll be just fine but pointers are very much appreciated.

The extra cost is in the extra 2 to 4 nines of uptime guarantee.

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