Microsoft is moving full steam ahead toward delivering most of its new SQL Server 2008 R2 versions to customer by May. But its high-end SQL Server 2008 R2 Parallel Data Warehouse isn’t going to be out in the first half of this year, as the company originally anticipated.

Microsoft officials confirmed in January that the company will begin shipping almost all of its new database SKUs in May 2010. At that time, they said they expected the Parallel Data Warehouse to be out by first half of 2010 (making it sound like it might slip to June).

On April 2, Microsoft officials said that the R2 Parallel Data Warehouse — codenamed “Madison” and based on the DATAllegro technology Microsoft purchased in 2008 — has no public due date. Microsoft is shipping a final technology preview of that product to private testers today and is seeking more Technology Adoption Program (TAP) participants interested in the data warehouse SKU, officials said via a blog post.

“Although our intent was to deliver SQL Server 2008 R2 Parallel Data Warehouse in the first half of 2010, we are still gathering customer feedback and working to ensure the high quality release our customers expect. Based on feedback from the customer Technology Adoption Program, we expect to announce more specific release timing, final configurations and pricing for our hardware partners in early summer (northern hemisphere). Stay tuned!” according to the SQL Server Team blog post.

The Parallel Data Warehouse version of SQL Server 2008 R2 will be sold preloaded on servers as a data warehouse appliance. Using the DataAllegro technology Microsoft acquired in 2008, it will scale customers’ data warehouses from the tens of terabytes, up to one petabyte plus range, according to the company.

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Call it Stack Wars. While competitors play tag-team, IBM on Monday reminded the market that it’s been delivering tightly bundled systems on its own for years and introduced its latest weapon in the race toward fully integrated business engines—Power7-based servers.

“This is not a chip announcement,” insisted Rodney Adkins, senior VP for IBM’s Systems and Technology Group, at a press conference at Manhattan’s opulent Mandarin Oriental hotel.

Adkins said the Power7 processor is just one part, though a key one, of a new family of IBM servers designed for a world where everything from toasters to 747s are computerized and online—and businesses will have to deal with all that data.

“Computing is becoming a lot more pervasive,” said Adkins, noting IBM expects there’ll be a trillion connected objects on the planet by next year. Financial institutions, healthcare providers, and other organizations will have to handle and make sense of the resulting information tsunami and will “require a new type of performance” from there hardware to do so, said Adkins.

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