No, they're very different. They have entirely different instruction sets as one example. As another, the z196 is clocked at 5.2 GHz and POWER7 at 4.25 GHz (in the 795 Turbo). The z196 is quad-core while POWER7 is octo-core. POWER7 has about 1.2 billion transistors and z196 about 1.4 million. POWER7 has a private per-core L1 instruction cache of 32 KB; z196, 64 KB. POWER7's private per-core L1 data cache is 32 KB; z196, 128 KB. POWER7's private L2 cache is 256 KB; z196, 1.5 MB. The L3 cache design is different, too. And those are just a few examples.

None of the IBM z/Architecture microprocessors (or their ESA/390 and prior predecessors) are listed yet. So Stanford is only missing the highest clock speed CPU ever created in the entire history of computing to date -- the IBM z196 microprocessor. Which seems like a rather serious and obvious omission. Also a bit insulting, since IBM has been announcing their new z/Architecture microprocessor breakthroughs exclusively first at Stanford's own "Hot Chips" conference for several years now. (Ooops.)

LTO-6 is not available yet. When available, each cartridge will hold up to 3.2 TB uncompressed. (I can make up practically any figure I want for compressed data capacity. It just depends on the type of data and the compression algorithm.) That's not bad, but IBM's TS1140 tape drive has been available since June, 2011. It supports tape cartridges that each hold up to 4.0 TB uncompressed. The Oracle StorageTek T10000C tape drive supports cartridges that each hold up to 5 TB uncompressed. It depends on what you're doing -- raw storage capacity per cartridge is certainly not the only relevant specification -- but there are interesting choices.

IBM hit 5.2 GHz in 2010. That's with all cores active and constant operating speed, too.

I have looked.

High-frequency (program) traders make big investments in computing that is located as close as possible to trading floors. They employ extremely expensive programmers to write highly proprietary code to run on these machines located on prime real estate, in speed of light terms. That's exclusively a rich man's (or firm's) game. I'm hard pressed to think of any way in which such trading helps allocate capital materially better to the real economy, which is the only useful purpose of finance. It's a grand waste of talent and resources that could be put to much better use elsewhere in the economy.

Somehow, prior to high-frequency trading, the world had plenty of liquidity, extremely narrow spreads, and not any more volatility than today (and probably less). I think the (real) world will do just fine without HFT.

Centralized computing works fabulously (and inexpensively) if you've got the right infrastructure. Mainframes work.

A lot of people get that wrong about IBM. For example, IBM's software business generates more profit than its services business. IBM is simply the most successful technology solutions company for business (and government) with the most extensive vertical integration of hardware, software, and services. If you think of IBM as primarily one of those businesses, you're entirely missing their business model. Their business model is not altogether unlike Apple's -- IBM and Apple have very similar philosophies in how to succeed -- but they don't compete.

No, a consistent user interface is not going to be enough. WebOS has a consistent user interface. Microsoft has a business model problem, and that's tough to fix. Application services are becoming more Web-based (cloud-based if you prefer), and Microsoft's Internet Explorer is no longer particularly popular. It's no problem running Safari, Chrome, or Firefox, mobile or tablet, to access the Web. (In many respects it's a better experience than IE on Windows.) Microsoft doesn't control much content distribution, doesn't control the dominant application ecosystems for mobile and tablets, and hasn't extended its Office franchise much less dominated in those dominant mobile and tablet ecosystems. (And those mobile and tablet ecosystems are doing just fine without Office, thanks.) On the back end, Linux dominates in the delivery of cloud-based services, not Microsoft. There are lots of business model problems here, and they only seem to be getting worse.