[SunHELP] SPARC Server 20...

[Kurt Mosiejczuk]

On Mon, 11 Feb 2002, Michael Vang wrote:

> I've been offered a SPARC Server 20 with 2x75MHZ CPUs (1MB each, I
> think) and 2x2.1GB hard drives and the full-height CDROM...

> It is NIB... Apparently it got put away and was never used...

> The seller wants 250 bux for it... I've always wanted a quad SS20, just
> for fun, but it looks like dual Ross 100MHZ MBus boards are priced a bit
> high...

Okay, so you know...  The existing processors in that 20 will probably
run rings around the dual 100Mhz Ross boards.  The SuperSparc II
processors are worth about twice (Mhz wise) what the Ross HyperSparc
modules are.  So, quad processors may have more geek points, but you'd
be better off with the Processors (which are SM71s).

Now... as for price.  First, there is no detail on memory... and that
could make a BIG difference.  But, myself, I wouldn't pay more than $200
and that's assuming it had at least 128MB of memory in it.  If you can
talk him down to $150, I say take it.

> Also, does the NVSIMM only accelerate Prestoserve or does it accelerate
> all disk I/O?

Well, Prestoserve needs an NVSIMM to work, so in that sense it only
accelerates Prestoserve.  But I recall Prestoserve can speed all disk
access on a box.  The big win is with NFS, since NFS requires synchronous
writes, which are very slow, unless you have Prestoserve...

Hope this helps you out.

--Kurt