Definition
Hardware and software compatibility means every required layer is supported together, not merely that a component can be installed. An IBM Power configuration can be physically possible and still fail the real requirement because the IBM i or AIX release, firmware, Hardware Management Console level, adapter, device driver, licensed program, or application dependency does not support that combination.
A compatibility check should start with the exact machine type and model, then connect it to the installed configuration baseline and the software workload. That produces a supportable configuration instead of a collection of parts that happen to fit.