Intel Corp. says it will make network servers for ISPs and other high-end customers, as well as selling the components to other system manufacturers. Called the Optical Services Platform, it is a system architecture that speeds fiber-optic network rates up to 2.5 gigabites per second. Intel says it will demo the product at the Intel Developer Forum this week in the form of a server supporting OC-192 for 10-Gbit per second transmission rates.

How much more real information is to come out of IDF is yet to be seen, and various writers have characterized the conference in very different ways. Industry insider Jack Robertson has pointed out that the most noteworthy aspect of the forum is what Intel is not announcing, namely the critical details of the company's chip set and memory roadmap as well as the release dates for the Pentium 4 and the 64-bit Itanium. He speculates that the company is playing catch-up right now due to its recent decision to abandon the Rambus-only strategy. It is also possible that the company may be holding back to see how the Rambus/Infineon lawsuit develops.

For more on the Optical Services Platform, read semibiznews.com. For two divergent speculations about the IDF, read ebnews.com and news.com.