AIX vs Linux for DataStage

[leomauer]

Our company is planning to move DataStage installation from Windows platform.
As a target platform AIX and Linux are been discussed.
Apparently Linux is cheaper and if we are not missing much comparing with AIX, then Linux it will be.
I am trying to make a case for AIX, but I do not know the facts.
I even not so sure myself.
Data volume is not too large, we are a pretty big manufacturing company. The feeds are coming daily and so are the loads.
The database is SQL server.
Can you share your opinions?
Thanks.

[Ultramundane]

Our company is planning to move DataStage installation from Windows platform.
As a target platform AIX and Linux are been discussed.
Apparently Linux is cheaper and if we are not missing much comparing with AIX, then Linux it will be.
I am trying to make a case for AIX, but I do not know the facts.
I even not so sure myself.
Data volume is not too large, we are a pretty big manufacturing company. The feeds are coming daily and so are the loads.
The database is SQL server.
Can you share your opinions?
Thanks.

May we ask, why they want to switch platforms?

I would probably choose windows because Datastage on windows has native database connectivity for SQL server.

[leomauer]

Ultramundane.
I work at this place only a few month. I do not know how and why the original platform was chosen (many years ago). I think it was more of the skill set decision.
This place does not have UNIX sysadmins.
Now the whole Data Centre operations are going to be outsourced and there are funding to replatform to get a better performance and stability.

[vmcburney]

This month (or maybe next month) IBM are releasing the Information Server Blade. See my blog post The IBM Information Server is Software is Hardware is People!. IBM chose Red Hat Linux as the operating system, not AIX. If you are doing a wholesale switch from Windows to Linux you should consider this product as it gives you a version 8 grid pre installed, configured and tested.