Linux vendor Red Hat will not be supporting Intel's Itanium chip architecture for its next-generation Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 (RHEL) platform.

RHEL 6 is still months away from a milestone release though, and as a result, current Red Hat (NYSE: RHT) Itanium customers have little to worry about. Red Hat is remaining committed to supporting Itanium on its current RHEL 5 platform until at least 2014.

The move by Red Hat comes as the Itanium processor family, backed by Intel and HP, continues to remain robust, despite 2009's economic pressures and earlier predictions of the platform's demise.

"The next major release of Red Hat Enterprise Linux will not provide support for the Itanium architecture; consequently, all Itanium-related development will be incorporated into Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 exclusively," a Red Hat spokesperson said in an e-mail to InternetNews.com.

Read the full story at Server Watch:
Red Hat Ditches Itanium in Upcoming Enterprise Release