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Hi to all,

I have an offer to buy a GenialStation 777S notebook for under 500$
(cad) and I was wondering if it is a good buy.

I need a laptop and I would like to install Gentoo or Solaris 10 with a
slim window manager. I need an all around system that can handle image
processing decently. I don't need MWindows at all and I tend to prefer
a good product that runs smoothly than a "silver bullet" that explode
anywhere between point A and B.

Here are the main specs:

-Processor: UltraSPARC IIe, 500 MHz, 256-KB L2 Cache

-Memory: 1GB maximum, ECC SDRAM (Installed 256MB) SODIMM (don't have
pin numbers)

- Graphics:On-board 24-bit 2-D/3-D Graphics accelerator, 24-bit color
supported up to 1024 x 768 (LCD Panel)

-Internal disk: 2.5", 20-GB, IDE Hard Disk

I did some research and this notebook worth 5000$ (us) 4 years ago. To
me it looks ambiguous; (-) on board graphic card, ide hard drive, 256kb
L2 cache...(+) expandable to 1GB ram, ultrasparc IIe... I don't know a
lot about hardware and even less about sparc's related.

I have a friend who is trying very old sun's station and server for
fun. He told me being suprised at how they are still functionnal. Can
I compare this notebook to some recent mainstream pc? Is is outdated,
can it serve my needs? Any comments would be welcome.

Thanks in advance,

Olivier Henley

zeta_no wrote:
> I compare this notebook to some recent mainstream pc? Is is outdated,
> can it serve my needs? Any comments would be welcome.

For $500, you are better to buy a more recent laptops that have faster
processors, faster RAM, disk, DVD burner, wireless etc. Solaris can (and
does) run well on laptops and is a safer bet than buying this SPARC laptop.

As for a comparison, a 500 US-II with a 1 GB RAM umm...would be in my
IMHO be equivalent to a say a PII-400 MHz (maybe a bit higher) laptop.

Save yourself a headache of throwing good money on old hardware (esp. a
laptop) and check out: http://www.opensolaris.org/os/community/laptop/

--
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Bruno Delbono | Systems Engineer | Open-Systems Group
Websites: www.mail.ac www.sendmail.tv www.open-systems.org
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thanks Bruno.

Now,

let say I forget the laptop and decide to stay home for all my work.
Would a Blade 2000, 900Mhz, 2 Gig ram, 32 Gig hdd (10K rpm) etc... be a
good buy for 400$. I think so... but I never used that beast. Right
now I own a modest HP, Athlon xp 2100, 512 ram, 120 Gig (5400 rpm) and
onboard 64 meg Geforce2. I manage to do my things, but, but, but... I
love linux, I want to learn by getting my hands on good machines, I
don't play games and I like recycling.

I have a hard time figuring out issues between consumer products (let
say pc's) and professional ones (Sun's, Sgi's etc...). Does a not so
fast professional workstation still remains much better than a consumer
desktop or does the later, by years of commercial pressure, outclassed
the former? I know, my poor Athlon has more technology in it than a 20
years old professional workstation, but is it the case for a 5 years
old one?

Please, let me know what you think,

Olivier henley

* zeta_no:

> let say I forget the laptop and decide to stay home for all my work.
> Would a Blade 2000, 900Mhz, 2 Gig ram, 32 Gig hdd (10K rpm) etc... be a
> good buy for 400$.

It depends on your applications. If you have native SPARC applications
then a Blade 2000 can be a very good buy indeed. If not then other
alternatives are probably much better...

> I think so... but I never used that beast. Right
> now I own a modest HP, Athlon xp 2100, 512 ram, 120 Gig (5400 rpm) and
> onboard 64 meg Geforce2. I manage to do my things, but, but, but... I
> love linux, I want to learn by getting my hands on good machines, I
> don't play games and I like recycling.

If it's mostly for fun then go ahead!

> I have a hard time figuring out issues between consumer products (let
> say pc's) and professional ones (Sun's, Sgi's etc...).

You seem to have a very limited view about "consumer products" and
"professional products". Consumer products are something like your HP
Pavilion Athlon PCs, they are build by 3rd party vendors to the lowest
price possible and to offer as much attractive features as possible. But
even when this is the most apparent part of PC world it's not limited to
it. There also are lots of professional class PCs (i.e. HP xw-Series,
Dell Precision, IBM Intellistation etc), and also Sun offers some
professional grade PCs.

> Does a not so
> fast professional workstation still remains much better than a consumer
> desktop or does the later, by years of commercial pressure, outclassed
> the former?

Honestly, if you expect a 3+ year old workstation to beat a current
el-cheapo PC in performance then you're dreaming. Sure, this old Sun
Blade 2000 or SGI Fuel or HP c3600 or whatever has been very expensive
when it was current, but this still doesn't mean it can do miracles. In
2001 I got a brand new Sun Blade 1000 with 2x900MHz USIII (non-CU), 8GB
RAM and Creator3D gfx which at that time IIRC did cost somewhere around
35kEUR. In the programs I had (mostly fp-intensive) the UltraSPARCIII
had a very hard time to keep up with the cheap intel Pentium4 1.5GHz in
my at that time 1 year old Dell Dimension 8100 PC which did cost around
1200EUR (which also included a 15" TFT). Of course the Sun had two
processors and 8 times the RAM but the overall performance wasn't even
close to what one would expect from a ~30 times more expensive machine.
At that time the price/performance ratio of x86 already was way better,
and also the overall performance of x86 already was in the upper range,
leaving lots of RISC CPUs already behind. And in terms of gfx with a
Blade 2000 you're limited to a bunch of more or less outdated gfx solutions.

> I know, my poor Athlon has more technology in it than a 20
> years old professional workstation, but is it the case for a 5 years
> old one?

Even your old AthlonXP will probably outclass a Blade 2000 with two
900MHz CPUs. Of course 512MB is very low and might be a bottleneck.

> Please, let me know what you think,

I think if you're doing it for fun, for learning or just because you
like old machines then go ahead and get a Blade 2000. But don't expect
it to perform even close to any somewhat newer PC in terms of performance.

If you're looking for a fast and reliable Solaris workstation then have
a look at the current workstations of the big vendors. A Sun Ultra 20
for example isn't very expensive and offers you way more bang for the
buck than a used Blade 2000...

Just my 0.02EUR

Benjamin

thank you Benjamin for the great insight.

o.henley

HI,

zeta_no wrote:
> thank you Benjamin for the great insight.
>
> o.henley
>
And a 3 year old WS is like a 3 year old Sportscar, which still handles
very nicely but performance wise a brand new Volvo stationwagon beat's it!

I would not pick the Volvo for fun

/michael