This is true at the 54xx/74xxlevel you will see very little difference and there is a slight improvement in processor performance. The initial Itanium machines 8440's.I was sent as test models all had a very nasty Cell Board issue when Npar'd. We never kept them. also shipped back the itanium version of the 4440 as it would randomly panic...all these issues have since been addressed it seems
The new processors are not interchangable with PARISC, they are diff motherboards and chipsets as well, HP had promised they would be even back in the N/V/L era but it never came to fruition. I see they even have Itanium superdomes now
O yes the itanium machines are a nice grey color too! much better than the standard HP "Quartz" color