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Whenever a Business Application needs to run highly available, secure, and performant to a large number of users, it is just a perfect fit …
Overview
What is IBM Z?
IBM Z is the company's mainframe enterprise server solution product line.
Recent Reviews
Awards
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Solution Planning Senior Manager
Accenture DACH (Information Technology & Services, 10,001+ employees)
Senior Technical Specialist
More than 20 different businesses over 30 years (Information Technology & Services, 1001-5000 employees)
Product Details
- About
- Competitors
- Tech Details
- Downloadables
- FAQs
What is IBM Z?
The new IBM z15 delivers performance,
flexibility, availability, protection, and agility to drive
digital transformation. It has changed the footprint of IBM Z
with a 19” frame, that scales from one to four frames depending on the
configuration, enabling significant floor space reduction.
IBM z15 has the commercial data privacy and security enforcement solution, Data Privacy Passports, that provides off-platform access revocation. Choose who accesses data, and when and at what level to revoke their access. One hundred percent of data, at-rest and in-flight, is protected with no performance trade off or application changes. With Fibre Channel Endpoint Security working with the latest DS8900F, achieve total end-to-end protection and authentication.
IBM z15 provides flexibility, portability and choice for hybrid cloud deployment. Cloud-native development simplifies life for developers as they build new applications and modernize existing ones. IBM Z supports private and public cloud via Linux, Kubernetes and industry-standard tools. With the Red Hat OpenShift support, IBM z15 adds to the user's options for cloud integration.
Instant recovery reduces the impact of planned and unplanned downtime. All systems need downtime for maintenance, and security patching.
IBM z15 has the commercial data privacy and security enforcement solution, Data Privacy Passports, that provides off-platform access revocation. Choose who accesses data, and when and at what level to revoke their access. One hundred percent of data, at-rest and in-flight, is protected with no performance trade off or application changes. With Fibre Channel Endpoint Security working with the latest DS8900F, achieve total end-to-end protection and authentication.
IBM z15 provides flexibility, portability and choice for hybrid cloud deployment. Cloud-native development simplifies life for developers as they build new applications and modernize existing ones. IBM Z supports private and public cloud via Linux, Kubernetes and industry-standard tools. With the Red Hat OpenShift support, IBM z15 adds to the user's options for cloud integration.
Instant recovery reduces the impact of planned and unplanned downtime. All systems need downtime for maintenance, and security patching.
IBM Z Features
- Supported: Data Privacy Passports
- Supported: IBM Z Data Privacy for Diagnostics
- Supported: IBM Recovery Boost
- Supported: Integrated Accelerator for zEDC
- Supported: Quantum-Safe digital signing algorithms
IBM Z Competitors
IBM Z Technical Details
| Deployment Types | On-premise |
|---|---|
| Operating Systems | Linux, z/OS, z/VSE, z/TPF, z/VM |
| Mobile Application | No |
IBM Z Downloadables
Frequently Asked Questions
IBM Z is the company's mainframe enterprise server solution product line.
Dell PowerEdge M and ClearPath Forward Libra are common alternatives for IBM Z.
Reviewers rate Support Rating highest, with a score of 9.1.
The most common users of IBM Z are from Enterprises (1,001+ employees).
Comparisons
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Reviews and Ratings
(134)Attribute Ratings
Reviews
(1-25 of 42)Companies can't remove reviews or game the system. Here's why
November 14, 2023
Secure the world and even more, with LinuxONE with every core
Whenever a Business Application needs to run highly available, secure, and performant to a large number of users, it is just a perfect fit for IBM Z. The out of the box virtualisation capabilities are far beyond of any other platform and make even single systems highly available. That helps to reduce costs because we do not need to invest in software solutions to make it HA. And for sure, this makes the handling much easier.
- Virtualization for Scale-Out and Scale-Up in the same footprint
- Security for different workloads: Large Confidential Computing and lightweight Secure Execution
- Performance is a true game changer: extreme throughput powered by amazingly huge caches.
- The one and only FIPS 140-2 Level 4 HSM on this planet
- Quantum Safe Encryption NOW!
- AI infusion to every transaction
- the amount of different pricing metrics is a inhibitor
- the ease of use is really getting better - but still DPM is not available for all workloads
- different pricing schemes for users vs. providers is a pain
October 10, 2023
IBM Z is an excellent option for reliable consolidation of a sprawling compute environment
Platform solves virtually all major technical issues with low latency, dynamic scaling and spike/surge handling, and hot sparing of all critical components. Compatibility with both 20+ year old applications and the most modern tech all on one platform makes it a great career path as well.
- High speed transaction handling with nearly guaranteed integrity
- Specialty processors for offload of CPU intensive activities like crypto, java
- Fast DR recovery with a single consistency group
- All facilities for extremely tight security are available
- The high centralization lowers environmental costs significantly
- Low cost training/education platforms needed for small companies/individuals
October 02, 2023
IBM Z - the AI Inspirer that reimagines delivery
I use IBM Z as the mainframe server framework, enabling enrichment with AI max productivity and statistical guidance.
- Ai guidance
- Innovation potentiation
- Continuing being a leading game changer; industry is in motion
September 26, 2023
Best way to process huge data.
IBM Z is used for transaction processing for credit cards.So every real-time transaction is captured and validates the transaction and everyday processing is done on the whole portfolio as part of night Batch processing. New application are also boarded and regular real time service requests regarding the account are processed and response are sent.
We current have IBM Z15 and are in the process of implementing IBM Z16. IBM Mainframes first and foremost provide not only the necessary uptime, fault tolerance, security, automation, high availability, etc. We currently utilize the IBM Z15 in a High Availability Scenario for many major applications. Utilizing one as primary and a secondary offsite at a secondary location. We also have the IBM Z carved out into LPAR's "Logical Partitions", which provide virtual environments for Test, Dev, etc. This is not new, LPAR's have been around for many many years on IBM mainframes, and another cool thing is we can create an LPAR and virtualize thousands of Servers in an isolated arena on the mainframe. We also use it has a test bed LPAR for AI along with Hybrid Cloud connectivity.
- Fault Tolerance
- High Availability
- Totally Agnostic
- Perform Large Scale Transaction Processing
- Overall Cost - Mainframes are expensive but you get what you pay for
- Software & Hardware Maintenance are pricey
- Learning curve for employees. Many MF folks have retired or are looking to retire
September 22, 2023
IBM Z review from a technician
Backend Server.
- 24x365 UpTime
- Transactional Work
- JAVA Server
- Software Cost of the Platform
September 19, 2023
Honesty about IBM Z
Our team create IaaS solution designs incorporating IBM Mainframe server, DS8000 storage technologies. The implemented IaaS solution used for host other commercial corporations Mainframe infrastructure. We also provide modernization service for aged deployments during the migration.
IBM Mainframes turned out are very reliable, secure and powerful computer systems. With proper pricing, their TCO can be really competitive compared with other systems.
On the downside, these are very archaic systems, very different mindset required for Mainframe operation than for any other more popular systems. Therefore very few people has proper knowledge, and finding / educating a workforce is challenging.
IBM Mainframes turned out are very reliable, secure and powerful computer systems. With proper pricing, their TCO can be really competitive compared with other systems.
On the downside, these are very archaic systems, very different mindset required for Mainframe operation than for any other more popular systems. Therefore very few people has proper knowledge, and finding / educating a workforce is challenging.
- reliability
- security
- powerful computing capacity
- cost
- lack of educated operators
- lack of free sandbox systems for education
September 18, 2023
z/OS - nothing better
We have two computers at our production site and one at our DR site. All computers run z/OS. One system runs a payroll application, and the other runs a provident Fund Application. Both systems provide services to external customers. The computers are connected to an IBM DS9810F storage system and an IBM TS7770 virtual tape system.
- Massive I/O
- Support many users concurrently
- Very little downtime required.
- It's hard finding new people with the required knowledge.
- It seems expensive.
September 12, 2023
Reliable and secured IBM Z
Mainly IBM Z's versatile platform addressed our wide array of business challenges
1. Deployed to cater to the needs of middleware applications.
2. Focused on the modernization of legacy IT systems which are crucial for business operations and user experiences.
3. Custom in-house applications specific to the Next-generation AI and data analytics
4. Deployed mainly focus on business applications that need robust Reliability and Availability.
1. Deployed to cater to the needs of middleware applications.
2. Focused on the modernization of legacy IT systems which are crucial for business operations and user experiences.
3. Custom in-house applications specific to the Next-generation AI and data analytics
4. Deployed mainly focus on business applications that need robust Reliability and Availability.
- Linux on Z applications can seamlessly operate on z/OS, which leverages z/OS operations staff and reuse the z/OS environment.
- Primarily container images with s390x architecture in the Docker Hub can
- be run in z/OS Container Extensions.
- Kafka alongside with ZooKeeper API, benifits from the centralized service that maintains configuration information.
- Unfortunately, there is no provision of morethan one one network interface in each virtual server instance of z/OS systems
- As a limitation at resource sharing, mainly Disks are not able to share between z/OS virtual server instances
- Compression is one of the key feature should be included to support in the PCIe
September 10, 2023
Worth it product by IBM.
IBM Z is used in our organization for large data requirements as it is very versatile and has the capacity to store large amounts of data. We have freedom of choice with the type of data we store and there are scalability options that are inherent with this product from IBM.
- Provided efficient storage for all the data needs.
- Very versatile with old firmware as this has a hybrid open platform.
- This has familiar dev tools for the developers which requires less turnaround time.
- While migrating to cloud there is a slight disruption in network.
- The User Interface can be improved which would make the product more intuitive.
- Detailed documentation with the product guide related to migration will be much appreciated.
Support the mainframe networks (tcpip & SNA) for our company. User of TSO and infrastructure tools.
- Large database management
- Legacy support
- Large scale API access to data
- Modernizing the unix stack
- Being more quick to market on application trends such as containers
April 13, 2023
The exclusive partner for IBM Z in the GCC recommends the mother of all servers for your enterprise needs
While my organization is an IBM Partner and we sell IBM Z to customers, we are a IBM Z user ourselves. Many of our internal workflow applications run on the mainframe platform and it has been supporting us for over a decade without having to take a downtime or even an upgrade. Reliability, Security and Scalability are the salient features of the platform. Getting it operational and forget it, it will run the company's business critical applications for you.
- Availability - Runs non disruptively 24x7
- Reliability - Never had to take an outage or unplanned downtime . Even it planned outage scenarios, it demonstrates high reliability, even though the platform is over a decade old now
- Scalability - It runs at close to 100% utilization levels and never hangs or crashes
- Security - Not even a single instance of it being hacked
- IBM marketing of its capabilities need to improve
- With such a great product, the industry perception is it being proprietary and expensive which needs to be clarified
- Many applications are still not available on the platform to make it mainstream and much more is the perception
January 02, 2023
IBM Z is the best among others
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Currently, the project we are working on in our team/company uses IBM servers, specifically IBM Z. This is also one of our customer's requirements and we want to do everything on IBM Z servers. We handle it ourselves. Very helpful in terms of service support. We have been using it for almost 7 months. The overhead of running workloads and copying data has been reduced. Its AI is the main thing that makes the decisions made practically realistic and increases the efficiency of work. This is one of the best I've seen from IBM. This is really great. So far, we haven't had many issues and no incidents requiring fines. He is one of IBM's great products.
- Usually it's fast when compared to other virtual power systems and low latency, hassle-free
- Speed and availability
- Effective and powerful
- Delay and data retrieval
- Connecticvity sometimes
November 30, 2022
Cloud at your premises
Reliable server which never fails, and has great disaster recovery offerings, is the definition of virtualisation, hence "the" cloud itself.
Yes, this is the mainframe, and yes, I am a mainframer.
Yes, this is the mainframe, and yes, I am a mainframer.
- Virtualisation
- Total cost of ownership
- Reliability
- User interfaces
- Customer education
- Customer relations
November 16, 2022
IMS on z/OS provides speedy transactions and high availability
Ericsson (formerly Telcordia) provides IMS DB/TM-based inventory systems for very large phone companies. Although primarily IMS-based, we use IMS Connect, DB2, and MQ as well. We make extensive use of MQ and IMS Connect to allow access to our systems for users beyond just the 3270 world. We transformed all our 3270 green screens with our Xj (JAVA eXtensions) product so our users have the advantage of a modern interface. MQ is used to interface with both our other systems that run on other platforms (UNIX, LINUX, etc) as well as an interface to other phone company systems not written by Ericsson.
- I/O is very fast in IMS and outside of IMS as well
- CPU speeds are as fast as any other platform
- User interfaces remain fairly constant (TSO, IMS, DB2, MQ, etc)
- Support is good, but more examples, especially of non-Z/os things like JAVA, would be helpful
- Security is becoming so prevalent it's cumbersome at times.
- Less emphasis on exits coded in BAL/ASM and more parmlib/proclib members would be helpful
September 24, 2022
Mainframe Support Technical Leader.
Core banking processing of billions of transactions and batch jobs each day to address all kinds of banking operations originating from different parts of the company. Thanks to IBM Z’s high availability features, the platform is the main backend for all mobile transactions that represent more than 80% of all of the bank's workload. Another key feature is security. IBM Z’s security features like RACF can build multiple levels of security, protecting all data and access!
- High availability and resilience.
- Security
- Compatibility ( old code can run along new code with conflicts).
- Cloud integration.
- Business models.
- Web interfaces.
September 17, 2022
A great software design for hybrid cloud, it has great security, keeps our files very safe.
It is trustable and grants high availability, which is very appropriate for managing different conversion processes like inventory and billing. Server trustability and can accumulate huge amounts of data. At first, it is challenging to learn, and we see that it is a high-priced platform; the command line interface should be upgraded, which makes it user-friendly and it is beneficial.
- Its efficiency and performance, It is trustable.
- IBM Z frame series mainframe system is like a skilled in the industry, protected, and it can do anything, almost distribute a lot of benefits in various sections.
- It has an affinity with a lot of modern technology as well.
- Difficult to learn at first.
- high prices.
- The Command line interface should be upgraded.
September 08, 2022
Precise Solution for System Automation and Application Support.
IBM Z delivers on digital transformation, where it delivers high performance and perfect protection, among others, to increase the validity of the business functionality. Besides, IBM Z focuses on data privacy, where reputable security is deployed, and access measures are deployed for correct individuals. The program has excellent flexibility, which allows both on-premise and cloud usage, which increases the convenience of the users.
- IBM Z has a perfect data privacy, which allows normal business functionality.
- Besides, flexibility of the tool increases swift functionality in digital transformation.
- Finally, the endpoint security is well articulated by IBM Z.
- IBM Z has complexity issue, where it burdens new users.
- IBM Z is pricey, and this challenges business users who are financially discouraged.
- Finally, IBM Z has poor recovery measures, where data privacy can be a challenge.
February 06, 2022
Excellent tool to handle large transactions and provide details data analytics for data storage and data warehousing.
Used across various functions 1. To handle various billing transactions 2. To handle data storage and data warehousing analytics 3. To handle run various automated batch processing.
- Very useful in handling different types of transactional processes like billing, inventory, etc.
- Provides detailed data analytics when data is stored or data is warehoused.
- Effectively used to run different types of data batch processing.
- Initial integration difficulties can be improved.
- Documentation can be drafted for migration strategy with some examples.
- Lack of awareness of the tool can be improved by conducting webinars.
January 17, 2020
The powerhouse of the world economy
The IBM z/OS is being intensively used to run batch processes of enterprise-level applications for various in-house projects. We actively make use of a whole array of IBM z/OS middleware services ranging from DB2 relational database management systems to the CICS transaction processing servers. Additionally, various other suites of technology are interfaced with the z/OS for additional services access.
- Batch processing.
- Server reliability.
- Legacy interface can be a bit hard to get around in the beginning.
- Difficult to replicate work environment at home for practice.
August 06, 2019
IBM Z Review of Actual Experiences by Destiny Corporation
IBM Z is used across many functions of the organizations we support. It handles transactional processes such as billing, CRM, claims, and other types of data entry functions. In addition, it is used for advanced analytics when the data is stored in databases and data warehouses that support this style of processing. It is also an extremely secure platform as both Z and Z Linux are not standard targets for hackers. Even their design offers no single admin user ID. As Donna Dillenberger of IBM Research said in a recent presentation 'We know better'.
- Transactional processing, including data entry across multiple departments
- Reporting on massive amounts of data, due to its scale and size of processing capabilities
- Analytics on data as there are various accelerators for both IBM's databases and others such as Oracle
- Security is another major benefit to this platform as it contains a non-open systems design
- It would be good if IBM could demonstrate more use cases for Z to potential clients
- A migration strategy from Open Systems to Z would be helpful
- Any additional marketing to could explain the benefits of Z/Linux, especially now that RedHat is in the mix.
May 24, 2019
IBM Z - Fast, Reliable and Secure.
IBM Z is used throughout the mainframe department. It addresses the availability, reliability and performance need for this ever-changing IT technology.
- Reliability - the IBM Z platform is very reliable and can handle millions of transactions without suffering performance.
- No comment
May 06, 2019
Z Review from Spring 2019 TechU
IBM Z is our enterprise system housing 90% of our data and does all of out back end processing. We execute 45 million CICS transactions and 24 million CICS transactions daily.
- Reliable - We have an SLA with our customers of 99% availability
- Scalable - IBM Z is the most scalable processors available. In January we had an unanticate 45% CICS transaction growth with on demand availablity we were quickly able to deal with this growth.
- Data Sharing and SYSPlex across LPARS with DB2 and IMS accommodates multiple jobs requiring simultaneous access and updates
- Improvements in CICS CPSM usability
- Reduce the cost - it is a very expensive platform with costs that are very easy see
- App dev improvements it is very difficult to implement lean processes on the platform
May 02, 2019
IBM Z and Storage Technology
IBM Z Mainframes are used to support z/OS and z/VM operating systems on a minute to minute basis.
These operating systems support critical applications and infrastructure to support front line business needs such as Claims Processing, Web Applications, DB2, CICS Transactions, and IMS Databases.
These operating systems support critical applications and infrastructure to support front line business needs such as Claims Processing, Web Applications, DB2, CICS Transactions, and IMS Databases.
- IBM Z Technology supports the critical Infrastructure needed for reliable Data Centers to support business needs.
- IBM Z Mainframe Technology is used worldwide for the amount of MIPS (Millions of Instructions Per Second) and processing power/data handled by this equipment.
- IBM Z Storage is Infrastructure that supports large amounts of critical data. (Direct Access Storage Devices, Virtual Tape Subsystems, and Physical back-end Tape)
- More access methods from a Management GUI Interface to help support on-site IBM SSR's perform job duties. IBM SSR's log into one or more IBM TSSC's (Management Interface for IBM personnel) to support Support Infrastructure needs such as: enabling AOS, offline of a back-end TS11** tape drive or Downloading VTD Exec's which could be critical fixes released from support seen in the field.
- More detailed/extensive lab testing before Ficon Host Adapters or ETH cards are released to new equipment sold in the field. We experienced multiple disruptive "Ficon Panics" within the recently purchased TS7760 Technology that had 16Gb Ficon cards behind a z14 mainframe with 16Gb Ficon cards. This turned out to be the following: shortage of data descriptors, block sizing, related to EEH or CAD code and we had an IBM TS7700 Architect come on-site and explain that a fix was made in the 8Gb Ficon cards that wasn't brought over into the 16GB Ficon cards. We've had to remove twenty 16Gb Ficon cards from seven TS7760's in our environment and replace with 8Gb Ficon cards until IBM Development release's VTD Exec's and CMVC fixes before another implementation plan.
May 02, 2019
IBM Z - Nice
As a credit union, we use IBM Z for all online transactions and batch processing, including on-line web interface and mobile transactions.
- On-line CICS transactions
- Batch processing
- More graphical user interface for newer Sysprogs