IBM Power 550 (8204-E8A)
You have a Power 550 8204-E8A. Here's what that means in 2026: IBM's step-up midrange Power6 server, out of standard IBM support since March 2019.
The Power 550 (8204-E8A) was IBM's step-up midrange Power6 server, scaling to 8 cores for commercial IBM i, AIX, and Linux workloads that had outgrown an entry-level Power 520 but didn't need the Power 570's multi-drawer scalability.
Power 550 at a glance
Where it stands in 2026
Power 550 lifecycle status
| Milestone | Date | What It Means |
|---|---|---|
| End of standard IBM support | March 31, 2019 | IBM no longer provides hardware maintenance, machine code updates, or security patches. |
| IBM i ceiling | Approximately IBM i 7.1 | Several releases behind current IBM i, with no OS upgrade path on this hardware. |
Dates per IBM Power6 end-of-service announcement letter 917-163.
See our maintenance page for third-party support options and our migration comparison for what a modern replacement actually looks like.
Sources
- IBM Inks In End Of Support For Power6 And Power7 Iron ... IT Jungle
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