[geeks] FC/AL: SPARCstorage Array on PC?

[Arno Kletzander]

Patrick Giagnocavo <patrick at zill.net> wrote:
> No chance, period.  Instead, get an older small system like a 
> SparcStation 20 and set that up.  They can be had for cheap or free.

Yep, no problem hardware-wise...have several sun4 machines to choose from. However it's not gonna happen until finally either ReactOS or NT for SPARC comes out... or I get really really comfortable with *n*x / *BSD.

Dave Fischer <dave at cca.org> wrote:
> Those are the first FC devices ever sold, and they jumped the gun a
> bit... FC wasn't finalized, and the SSA isn't compatible with what
> became the first version of real FC. So it is completely incompatible
> with anything else. Those sbus cards are the only thing ever made
> that will talk to them.

Duh, bad news; thanks anyway. I'd have to think about reverse engineering the protocol and making up an interface (USB?), but really should not since my time and resources won't permit it anyway...

> On the up side, they are nice boxes, although a bit slow. They seem
> to have problems fully recognizing 18g & up drives though, so you're
> stuck at 9g drives max.
> 
> Also, early models have a smaller power supply, and you can't fill
> them with later (faster) drives than they were designed for. 

O.K., not a problem here. Used-but-good SCA-80 drives are a bit scarce here anyway, the bigger the worse.

So long,

-- 
Arno Kletzander
Stud. Hilfskraft Informatik Sammlung Erlangen
www.iser.uni-erlangen.de

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