IBM's monster mainframe is built to handle your mobile shopping
Shopping from your phone is a big deal these days, but it requires a lot of effort behind the scenes to run smoothly -- when there are thousands of people tapping "buy" in short succession, they can easily bring a server to its knees. That crush might not be a problem for stores that have IBM's beastly new z13 mainframe, though. The system's gobs of CPU power (the "world's fastest microprocessor," IBM claims), memory and bandwidth let it handle a whopping 2.5 billion mobile shopping transactions per day, or enough that even a mad rush like Black Friday shouldn't bog it down. It's fast enough to analyze every deal in real time, too, so it's more likely to catch someone who stole your credit card info before you have to dispute any unwanted charges. You'll probably never know which specific apps and sites are using the z13, but this giant computer might just save you from inordinate waits and rude surprises the next time you're ordering online.
[Image credit: IBM, Flickr]
