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IBM surprised us with how cool its eServer xSeries 330 really is. The company's Cable Chaining Technology, or C2T, makes this a great box. C2T allows as many as 42 xSeries 330 boxes to be daisy-chained: Simply connect the monitor, mouse and keyboard to the top or bottom unit; KVM features are built right into the server. There's an easy-to-find button on the front of the xSeries 330 to select the machine, and you can also select the machine from the keyboard.

Serial management ports can be daisy-chained on units in a rack, and the ports can share one modem or other serial device for remote management of the rack. Our test unit performed adequately, with middle-of-the-pack performance; for example, average total response time was 0.292 seconds, compared with 0.308 for Dell's offering. But in the end, IBM's excellent, innovative features won us over.

On the hard-disk end, the xSeries 330 has bays for as many as two hot-swappable Adaptec Ultra 160 SCSI hard drives, plus an IDE CD-ROM and a floppy drive. Therein lies the only real knock we can make on this machine: IBM supplies only two drive bays, compared with three on the HP and Dell boxes. On the whole, however, this is not a huge problem because most companies will use these servers with external storage. IBM is also using ServerWorks' ServerSet III LE chipset (see "Have Some Chips").

The machine IBM sent us contained one 933-MHz Pentium III processor. Also embedded are two Intel 82559 Fast Ethernet controllers that can be set to fault tolerance, adaptive load-balancing or Fast Etherchannel modes.

The xSeries 330 has IBM's Netfinity Advanced System Management processor, a Power PC with its own OS, built on the motherboard. It's used for remote console management, diagnostics, fan/power supply monitoring and IBM's Light Path diagnostics, which can lead you or an IBM technician right to a failed component by means of LEDs. This impressive feature works even when the system will not boot. IBM's front panel has two bays for the two hot-swappable SCSI hard drives of up to 36 GB each, CD-ROM and floppy-disk drives, and recessed reset and power buttons. We're disappointed that IBM fails to include link or activity lights on the front of the machine.

The xSeries 330 supports up to 4 GB of ECC SDRAM (error-correcting code Synchronous Dynamic RAM). For processors, the server supports two identical Intel Pentium III processors of 800 MHz, 866 MHz, 933 MHz or 1 GHz. It has two 64-bit PCI slots--one full-length and one half-length. It has one power supply, rated at 200 watts. That may not seem like a lot, but remember that you can put only two drives in this unit. A larger power supply is simply not necessary.

On the software front, IBM includes its ServerGuide; we received version 6.0.2a. ServerGuide, while not the best installation software we've ever seen, is perfectly adequate. Installation of Microsoft Windows NT 4.0 went smoothly. IBM also includes Netfinity Director, a systems management tool with plug-ins for Tivoli Systems' TME and support for some third-party software. Documentation is provided on CD-ROM. The xSeries 330 has a three-year on-site parts and labor warranty, with service provided by IBM's ubiquitous services organization. Upgrades to the warranty are available.

eServer xSeries 330, $2,865 (Web price). Available: Now. IBM, (800) 426-4968, (914) 499-1900; fax (914) 765-7382. www.pc.ibm.com.