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IBM Power Systems vs Intel Server System comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 11, 2026

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

IBM Power Systems
Ranking in Rack Servers
5th
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
5.8
Number of Reviews
72
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Intel Server System
Ranking in Rack Servers
11th
Average Rating
6.6
Number of Reviews
3
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2026, in the Rack Servers category, the mindshare of IBM Power Systems is 6.6%, down from 8.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Intel Server System is 4.1%, down from 4.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Rack Servers Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
IBM Power Systems6.6%
Intel Server System4.1%
Other89.3%
Rack Servers
 

Featured Reviews

Foluso  Jibowo - PeerSpot reviewer
Product Manager at Hiperdist Ltd
Has empowered enterprises with secure and cost-effective solutions
When discussing disadvantages, I do not see many areas for improvement because we have received good testimonies from every client. IBM gives customers peace of mind. One challenge, which I would not really call a challenge, is that initially people have the notion that IBM Power Systems is quite expensive. However, IBM does not lose deals based on price. This is a message we need to keep communicating to people who feel that IBM is on the high side in terms of cost. We encourage them to have a discussion with us about their total cost of ownership over three or five years. There is a notion in the market that IBM is expensive, which is false. However, once we engage and show them their return on investments and their total cost of ownership savings, they tend to embrace IBM.
SA
Servers Senior Network Administrator at Dukat d.d.
A stable product that constantly enhances its functionalities like multithreading and caching
The most valuable feature of the solution stems from the fact that it is more stable than AMD for VMware. Intel Server System has a good track record for the last 20 years. Multithreading and caching are areas where improvements keep increasing. If you look at the last four years, you will see a big difference when it comes to the area concerning processors.

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"We go with Power Systems because the reliability and the availability of the systems are key."
"Power Systems is like a dream solution for every IT person because it has redundancy, and it doesn't stop. It doesn't get affected easily. I don't see any weaknesses in this solution. At the moment, we have Power8. It is stable and runs smoothly. We have a big load, and it is working very well. It can be customized based on our needs. Flash copy is helping us amazingly. We have virtualization for vDisks, which is again very helpful. We are working on this virtualization technology, and we have a team that is working on redundancy and architecture."
"It is a very scalable solution."
"I would say if you are not using the IBMi solution, you are missing something."
"The best features of the solution are its robustness and service level."
"We've been very satisfied with the solution's capabilities."
"Active Memory Expansion allows you to compress your memory on the run time to allow you to have less physical memory available, but provision more memory to your partitions, as everything will be compressed on the fly."
"When the other platforms are going down, and they're working on them all the time, mine's always up."
"The most valuable feature of the solution stems from the fact that it is more stable than AMD for VMware."
"I would recommend this product; it is stable with good performance, and we are satisfied with Intel's products."
"The price is competitive and it uses well known architecture and it's easy to develop for."
"It is stable and easy to manage."
 

Cons

"In East Asia, the support gets abysmal."
"The initial setup is not straightforward."
"Its pricing could be better."
"IBM should be more flexible with marketing or offer marketing events themselves and invite the partners to attend. That might be far more productive."
"What I'd like to see would be more of a usage-based licensing model."
"The solution is quite expensive, and deploying it was also expensive."
"Overall, IBM actually does restrict us, the sellers, at a limited percentage of margin when you're selling the product. We cannot go above 8%."
"It would be ideal if the solution was more simple to work with."
"The shipment time can be improved. When we order Intel products, we have to wait for a long time. They can increase the local services and engineers in China. Local engineers will be able to know and understand customer problems much better."
"When you have an Intel Server System, the prices may be much higher since it is a different processor, making the solution's pricing part one of its shortcomings where improvements are required."
"We have to scale it ourselves but it scales. It depends on the software because it's mostly the hardware platform that Intel is managing."
"I give it five out of 10 because, although they're well known, the system isn't really advanced compared to some of the competitors."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Why should I be charged for that use rather than a single CPU, a single socket?"
"It is designed for a large workload, as opposed to a small workload. For our circumstances, and even as an independent, I can't buy a Power system to experiment on. It can't happen. You cannot buy them."
"The price of IBM Power Systems is expensive and could improve."
"IBM Power Systems is very expensive."
"The licensing costs are okay. With IBM Power Systems, it's inclusive, so you can differentiate the price of the hardware from the software itself."
"The price of the solution depends upon the configuration part of it. Based on what configuration you want to go for it, there is a range like IBM Power Systems POWER9 and IBM Power Systems Power10."
"The cost model is great. There is so much built in to the technology, that if you know how to use it you can save yourself a lot of money."
"The price of the solution could be somewhat better and this is what lowers my rating of it to a seven or eight out of ten."
"I rate the pricing a ten on a scale from one to ten, where one is inexpensive, and ten is very expensive."
"The price is competitive."
"It is not expensive."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
13%
Outsourcing Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Construction Company
6%
Financial Services Firm
14%
Computer Software Company
8%
Retailer
6%
Insurance Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business17
Midsize Enterprise19
Large Enterprise42
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with IBM Power Systems?
In my opinion, the product can be improved by maintaining it and not sunsetting it; that would be my recommendation for IBM. I used to work for IBM for nineteen years, and I know, unfortunately, I ...
What is your primary use case for IBM Power Systems?
I am an architect and system administrator, and I'm responsible for anything related to IBM Power Systems. In IBM Power Systems, I have found a lot of valuable features such as LVM, TCP, ODM, RSCT,...
What advice do you have for others considering IBM Power Systems?
I would recommend IBM Power Systems to others. I have given this review a rating of ten out of ten.
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Also Known As

IBM OpenPOWER LC
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Cipher
Emerson, Baosight, Pentamaster
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM Power Systems vs. Intel Server System and other solutions. Updated: September 2026.
919,088 professionals have used our research since 2012.