I am buying someone a Sun SPARC?. What do I buy?

From: healyzh_at_aracnet.com <(healyzh_at_aracnet.com)>
Date: Wed Dec 8 19:17:32 1999

> I have 0 experience with Sun. I have a friend who really likes Sun but has a
> Sun SPARC IPX?. What model does anyone here recommend I buy for just under
> $2K US. I see the Sun IPXs are selling cheap on eBay so are they a low end
> machine? [thats what he has right now].
>
>
> I am buying this for an XMAS present - probably on eBay.
>
>
> I see right now:
>
> Sun SPARC 10,7,5, Ultra 1, and others.
>
> Any recommendations?
>
> john

I'd recommend one of the following:

used Sparc 20 w/Dual SM71 CPU's, 128MB+ RAM, 2GB+ Hard Drive
        Reasons for: Coolness factor, can get this config w/21" monitor for
                     about $1500
        Reasons Against: Slow by todays standards, cost of 100Mbit Ethernet
                         and 24-Bit graphics
used Ultra 1 w/128MB+ RAM, 24-bit colour
        Reasons for: ?
        Reasons Against: Cost of 100Mbit Graphics, slow by todays standards
new Ultra 5 for $1995
        Reasons for: Killer price for a nicely outfited box
        Reasons against: only 64MB RAM (this is easy to fix), PCI, EIDE HD


I'm personally looking at all of the above, and will probably go with a
Sparc 20 in that config when the price drops low enough. Emotionally I think
the Sparc 20 is very cool, logically I think it's overpriced, for it's
speed and age. Personally the Ultra 1's don't interest me, I'd rather go
with a Ultra 5 despite it's short comings if I was to get an Ultra. The
system I'd *REALLY* like isn't listed above, is a nice Dual Processor Ultra 2
with plenty of RAM and HD space, but those run $10k+!

Because of the above reasonings my main Solaris box is a Dual Processor
400Mhz Celeron w/256MB RAM, 6GB Hard Drive, 24-Bit colour, 100Mbit ethernet,
32x CD-ROM, 16bit soundcard. Such a beast will blow any of the above away
and cost under $1000. <sigh> Not as cool as a Sun box, but it makes a lot
more sense from a monitary standpoint. Oddly enough when it's running
Solaris it's also the box Netscape runs the fastest on...

                                Zane
 
Received on Wed Dec 08 1999 - 19:17:32 GMT