[OpenIndiana-discuss] Suitable Dev box to replace Ultra 80

[Daniel Kjar]

I would love a sparc port.  Right now I am putting openbsd on my 
blade1000 because I hate to see it sit there and collect dust.  I just 
wish we had a driver for the xvr-1200 although truthfully vi doesn't 
really need much 3d acceleration.

On 01/23/12 08:04 PM, Peter Firmstone wrote:
> I've used Sparc since the 90's, in my undergrad university days, I 
> used to log in remotely to the University network, using a Sparc 
> Classic, I never suffered the consequences of MS Word documents 
> becoming corrupted, or the other PC reliability issues and had the 
> benefit of additional account privileges (unofficially) like untimed 
> internet access, only because the sysadmin used sparc and all the 
> important infrastructure at the Uni was sparc or Unix based.
>
> I'm somewhat afraid of using Intel hardware, especially on the 
> internet, due to the bios and network hardware security issues that 
> OS's can't prevent.
>
> OpenBoot is far more powerful than typical x86 bios.
>
> It would be nice to have a Niagara dev box, for multi threading 
> development.
> How portable is Openindiana, from what I can tell it's intel only?
>
> How easy is Openindiana to build, do you think there would be enough 
> interest in a sparc port?
>
> Or perhaps an ARM64 port?  Arm seems to have much greater economy of 
> scale and could displace x86 the same way x86 displaced the big Unix 
> vendors (well actually it was more like top brass knee jerk reactions, 
> like Alpha's untimely and premature death).  Unlike Intel, anyone can 
> license arm (or sparc for that matter, but ARM has the numbers).
>
> If Openindiana was to support ARM64 some time in future, now would be 
> the time to start, while hardware vendors are looking to enter new 
> markets.
>
> Cheers,
>
> Peter.
>
>>
>> Message: 4
>> Date: Mon, 23 Jan 2012 08:22:40 -0500
>> From: Daniel Kjar <dkjar at elmira.edu>
>> To: Discussion list for OpenIndiana
>> <openindiana-discuss at openindiana.org>
>> Subject: Re: [OpenIndiana-discuss] Suitable Dev box to replace Ultra
>>     80
>> Message-ID: <4F1D5F20.6010802 at elmira.edu>
>> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed
>>
>> If you like old sun hardware you could pick up an ultra 40 or 20 
>> used.  I put a 3ghz dual core in my ultra 20 and 8 gbs of ram + 4 
>> hard drives.  The 40 has much better options.  I also have a 4x2 core 
>> (885s I believe) v40z with 32gb of ram I picked up for 500 dollars a 
>> couple years ago.  That is my openindiana sunray server.  Follow the 
>> instructions on the sunray users forum and it works great.  No kiosks 
>> though.  Sadly I have had to retire my old blade1000 due to the same 
>> kind of stuff you mention.  I use the ultra 20 as a file server and 
>> my desktop.  08:21am  up 61 days 21:53
>>
>>
>>
>> On 01/22/12 12:16 AM, Peter Firmstone wrote:
>>> Hi,
>>>
>>> I've got a Grandfathers Axe, Ultra 80, 4 CPU, 4GB Ram, 4 x 2.5" SAS 
>>> Drives, 2 x 3.5" SCSI, 2x XVR-1000's and dual 24" LCD Monitors.  I 
>>> had been waiting for Sun to release a new sparc workstation, but it 
>>> never happened.
>>>
>>> Its a Java dev box, all round work computer (with sunray clients), 
>>> has a zone with a web server, online since 2005.
>>>
>>> I recently noticed that JDK1.7 isn't supported on my release of 
>>> Solaris 10, I'm guessing it isn't on Openindiana either ;), but 
>>> better to have community support than nothing at all!
>>>
>>> I also participate in the Apache River project, once I replace this 
>>> workstation, our software will no longer be tested on Solaris Sparc, 
>>> so support for that OS / Hardware combo will be dropped.
>>>
>>> What's the best (Rock solid) CPU / Motherboard / ECC Ram / Hardware 
>>> to run Openindiana with?  Can Openindiana server thin clients eg ltsp?
>>>
>>> Where do you order Openindiania DVD's?
>>>
>>> Thanks,
>>>
>>> Peter.
>>>
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> OpenIndiana-discuss mailing list
>>> OpenIndiana-discuss at openindiana.org
>>> http://openindiana.org/mailman/listinfo/openindiana-discuss
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> OpenIndiana-discuss mailing list
> OpenIndiana-discuss at openindiana.org
> http://openindiana.org/mailman/listinfo/openindiana-discuss

-- 
Dr. Daniel Kjar
Assistant Professor of Biology
Division of Mathematics and Natural Sciences
Elmira College
1 Park Place
Elmira, NY 14901
607-735-1826
http://faculty.elmira.edu/dkjar

"...humans send their young men to war; ants send their old ladies"
	-E. O. Wilson