[SunRescue] Re: New SunBlade

[Ken Hansen]

The usefull-ness of desktop cases is that they are *rackable*...

The SunBlade was not designed to be a server, so having only a few internal drive slots is not a problem (to my view of the box). Besides, with 75 Gig IDE HDs on the market, how many drive slots does one need? Or, if you follow Suns desired upgrade path, 2x15 Gig drives is plenty for *many* desktop/rack applications...

This raises the popular question, how much data do you want hanging on the same spindle?

So, the form-factor is nice (AFAIAC) and the internal upgrade path is fine too... Assuming you add the $60 Symbios SCSI adapter for your external drives...

To my mind, the Sun Blade 100 is only about $60 away from being as flexible as an SS/20 base (save SMP functionality, but 500 MHz UltraSPARC vs. 4x Fast MBUS CPUs is a reasonable compromise, IMHO).

Ken

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Chris Byrne [mailto:chris at chrisbyrne.com]
> Sent: Monday, March 19, 2001 12:49 AM
> To: rescue at sunhelp.org
> Subject: RE: [SunRescue] Re: New SunBlade
> 
> 
> Two things, expansion, and form factor
> 
> I'll (excuse the horrid pun) expand here. The SB100 is an 
> extremely good
> value, however it offers very little room for expansion. 
> There are only two
> drive bays, and it only offers PCI based graphics which would 
> take up one of
> its three slots. Also from what I have seen the pci slots are fairly
> cramped.
> 
> The U10 on the other hand has four drive bays (trust me, a 
> 3-1/2" drive fits
> in the pcmcia card slot), offers UPA graphics, and there's 
> plenty of room
> for cards, with FOUR slots, but the RAM options are a lot 
> less flexible, and
> a lot more expensive, and it doesn't have USB.
> 
> Oh and there is the secondary issue of form factor. Desktop 
> style machines
> take more desk real estate, which for some sites may be a big 
> issue. Also
> desktop form factor machines can have more heat buildup 
> issues since the
> components arejust a bit closer together. In particular the 
> Ultra 5 has had
> problems with the heat issue, even more so if you load the 
> thing up with
> cards, and stick high performance drives in.
> 
> So really it comes down to wherther the SB100 will meet your 
> needs without
> expansion, or if you will need to make upgrades other than RAM or hard
> drives. If you need the extra expansion get the U10, 
> otherwise the SB100 is
> great.
> 
> Now what I really want to see is an SB100-like replacement 
> for the U10 (only
> with more cache)
> 
> Chris Byrne
> =======================================
> The eyes may be the windows on the soul
> But the word is the doorway to the mind
> =======================================
> 
> *I wish there was more room for cables though. I think Sun 
> designed them to
> make it intentionally difficult to connect drives to a scsi 
> card by making
> cable routing hell
> 
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: rescue-admin at sunhelp.org [mailto:rescue-admin at sunhelp.org]On
> Behalf Of Paul Nguyen
> Sent: Sunday, March 18, 2001 20:55
> To: rescue at sunhelp.org
> Subject: [SunRescue] Re: New SunBlade
> 
> 
> I am looking at picking up additional sun desktop machines 
> and debating
> between the Ultra 10 and the new sunblade.  The U10 is more 
> expensive but we
> are used to maintaining them.  Does any one have any input of 
> pros and cons
> between the 2 machines?.
> 
> Thanks
> Paul
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