Back in March, Oracle suggested that they would stop supporting Intel’s high-end Itanium chip. Intel and HP (the biggest seller of Itanium-powered servers) were understandably aggrieved, and argued that Oracle was being creative with the facts in order to boost sales of competing technology from Sun (now owned by Oracle, remember). Now IBM (another company with a competing offering in the shape of their Power line) is joining in, with Senior VP Rod Adkins today quoted by InformationWeek claiming that Itanium is a “dead end.” Why Adkins didn’t say any of this when Oracle’s people were happily bad-mouthing the chip is anyone’s guess, and it’s as difficult to separate marketing spin from fact now as it was back in March. Intel and HP are presumably about to defend their chip as vigorously as they did back in March, and from  amongst all the mud-slinging some truth may eventually emerge.