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A similar system to the one in my OP
Yes they are cheaper but still way overpriced compared to commodity x64 hardware and I don't know what preformance gains you get from 4x450Mhz over 1x1.8Ghz.
I'd love to try out Solaris on SPARC and get geek points for having obscure hardware but not at those prices.

I've seen the 3000 series with 8 procs or so go for prices near that. Plus you can get similarly configured Sun workstations for less money. (I inherited a two processor 4GB Ultra 60 myself.)

Check out http://www.anysystem.com/ sometime. You can get REALLY cheap Sun hardware there.

The actual servers in the racks are the LEAST valuable part of a good data center. They're also the highest depreciating.

No doubt, you can pick up used Sun equipment CHEAP. For instance, I love to window shop AnySystem, one of their current "Ugly Duckling Special" (scratched boxes, missing face plates, etc.) had a list price of $21,000 - you can get it now for $1200 (yeah - a 6GB RAM, 6 CPU SPARC box for a grand). You can get this stuff second-hand for 5% of what they cost less than a decade ago. With the storage rigs, the drives cost more than the rackmount/backplane. Unfortunately, drives don't usually live long enough to make it to the second hand market, and you don't want the ones that do.

The actual servers in the racks are the LEAST valuable part of a good data center. They're also the highest depreciating.

No doubt, you can pick up used Sun equipment CHEAP. For instance, I love to window shop AnySystem, one of their current "Ugly Duckling Special" (scratched boxes, missing face plates, etc.) had a list price of $21,000 - you can get it now for $1200 (yeah - a 6GB RAM, 6 CPU SPARC box for a grand). You can get this stuff second-hand for 5% of what they cost less than a decade ago. With the storage rigs, the drives cost more than the rackmount/backplane. Unfortunately, drives don't usually live long enough to make it to the second hand market, and you don't want the ones that do.

Yeah, it seems like overpriced iron when compared to x86, especially when you look at it through the eyes of 'MHz Myth', but Sun does have great hardware. I don't know about you, but I spend a good deal of time each and every day waiting on bottlenecked busses.

I start feeling it when an X86(-64) box hits a load average of about 3; while the box I SSH to for school (SPARC) chugs along smoothly at a load of 15. Then again, I think Linux and Solaris compute load averages differently, so take it with a grain of salt moreso than most anecdotal stories. I'm thinking about investing in an old SPARC box. They're cheap second hand at Anysys.

Consider Anysystem.com, where you can get dirt-cheap Sun gear. Check out the Ugly Duckling specials for working systems with cosmetic damage dirt cheap. They sell IBM server stuff, too, but that's pretty much all marked "call for pricing".

I can pick one of those puppies up for about $9K used:

http://www.anysystem.com/sunen10e12ra.html

"Here's a nickel, kid, get yourself a better computer."
                                                      -Dilbert

Sun's A5200s are cheap on eBay, and you can pick up something like a 420r or a 250 to drive the thing.

Even better is to check AnySystem.com for your needs. Their everyday prices are excellent, and their EBay prices are even better! (Often you can get an 8 way system loaded with fibre channel drives and GIGs of RAM for $2000-$3000.) I don't have any affiliation with them other than trying to get my boss to replace our expensive Windows servers with AnySystem servers. :-)

Has anyone else used these guys?

It's not just because I work there. . . but we (AnySystem.com) do Sun and we do it well. We have a huge warehouse full to the brim with Sun gear (yes, ancient AND new SunFire) - we do straight sales, as well as leasing, maintenance, hardware and software support and if you look us up on ebay, our reputation is second to none. Please check us out and drop me a line (x122)

Oh and we're right across the river from Manhattan. Can't beat that with a bat. -Dave x122 (PS> We also do IBM, HP/Compaq, Dell and EMC, but admittedly, our specialty is Sun.. .) </shameless plug>

I like Sun hardware, always have. But what happens when in "just a couple of years", these Sun chips aren't all that fast anymore? Do you keep them around just because you paid a lot for them?

I don't know about you, but I can always find a use for a Sun machine. They're built to last, and can often still be useful for a decade after their manufacture. The worst case is that you can resell your old machines to a refurbisher like AnySystem so that it can gain new life in someone else's possession. I know of plenty of companies where the AnySystem servers are powerhouses for the work they need to do. I also know of a lot of developers and sysadmins who would like a Sun Workstation, but can't afford new. Again, AnySystem (or Ebay, take your pick) can provide them with a system that meets or exceeds their needs. :-)

if you're in the mood to purchase a non-relic

Seriously, though, if Linux can have a penguin, Sun's Java a steaming cup of coffee (coffee, java, geddit?), and anysystem.com a rubber duck, why not a little daemon? Lighten up, world.

and the best place to get your Sun hardware: Anysystem.com

It's the big, heavy, gray and purple box with 'Ultra Enterprise' on it.

I've got one of them warming my feet and building Gentoo 2004.3 as I type.

This has lessened significantly in recent years, but still, when their tech is desirable, it's typically out of the reach of the high end (as in knowledge) individual user. Pisses me off to no end that when they come out with something that could be used, they miss the individual.

Thank God that Sun hardware never becomes truly obsolete, eh? Visit AnySystem to get yourself some amazingly cheap hardware. And keep an eye on their ebay auctions. I've seen more than one E8500 go for ~$3000! That's 8 processors, 9x(8Gig) fibre channel disks, multiple network cards, 6-8 GIGS of RAM, and lots of other goodies! Just slap a "free Solaris 9" copy on there and run with it! I just wish I had a few extra grand for this sucker. Now if Sun would *just* provide a cheaper version of their RayStation Server Software, I'd have my entire apartment complex wired! ;-)

Not bad, but I'll do you one better: Anysystem.com I've had great experiences with them and you can get better pricing than on the website by calling them direct.

As someone who was once an Admin for a 40 user Citrix machine, I'm going to address everyone's statements about comparing Terminal Server.

What I found when we used Citrix is that support cost dropped dramatically. The majority of the problems were either "I have my numlock on" type of problems or from the PCs in the marketing department. (They didn't like Citrix very much and had the political clout not to use it.) In general, users were happier and more productive since they couldn't mess up the system or access any software except the ones we put in their list of icons. If they did something stupid like moved all their icons off the screen, they'd simply log off and log back in and everything would be fixed. If they wanted a permanent change, a quick phonecall to IT would take care of it.

Now, the problem with Citrix/Terminal Server is scale. 40 users was about all you could handle on the machine before you went beyond the architectural limits of Intel hardware (i.e. 4 gigs of RAM). This meant that shops larger than we were, had to spread their users across multiple Citrix machines. Not too bad, but every machine increases support costs substantially. With hundreds of users, you'd be supporting tens of machines. Not good. On top of that, it was still a windows machine. Every time we needed to upgrade software, patch the system, or change just about any setting, the machine had to be rebooted. The system would also crash on occasion and have to be rebooted. Processes would run away and couldn't be killed and we'd have to reboot. As you can imagine, our users didn't like it much when halfway through the day they had to save their work and sit around until the machine was back up.

Before I left, we had several projects underway to look at the viability of using Unix to replace Citrix as a more stable, lower cost alternative to Microsoft's forced upgrade to Terminal Server. (Terminal Server, BTW, was over 3 times the cost of Citrix. And we couldn't go with a Citrix upgrade because the new version was an add-on to Terminal Server!) This was especially viable for us since our NeoWare thin clients supported the X protocol as well as the Citrix protocol. Although, that was not a huge problem since Citrix for Unix was looking to be a good alternative to the X protocol.

So what was the number one problem in our way? Office? Nope, StarOffice was fine. Email? Nope, we used low-cost POP3 mail. Proprietary software? We didn't use much and the stuff we did use could be relagated to the old Citrix machine and run as "Citrix Applications". No, the real problem was the web browser. We were using Netscape 4, but it was showing its age and we were beginning to have problems with sites that required IE (which we were unable to install correctly). So our choices were looking pretty thin. The best solution on the horizon was Mozilla/Netscape 6. Unfortunately, it really wasn't ready for prime-time.

If I was to do the study again today, I don't think there would be a single point against Unix that I could find. Netscape 7.2 is strong and stable, OpenOffice 1.0 is a decent MsOffice replacement, and more and more software is being ported to Unix. Initial costs can even be mitigated by buying used E3500s+ from companies like AnySystem. And I can just keep going with that system for years without worrying about the next major OS update.

So in closing... Die Terminal Server, Die! :-)

Yeah, blatant plug for my small startup. Tell 'em Dave sent ya. price might drop a little.

Cheap SPARC hardware: Anysystem.com

Sun -does- discontinue parts, but there's loads of places where you can get parts for old Sun boxen.

Like here or here. These are just 2 of *many* places you can get old Sun parts.

Hate to sound like an ad, but I bought a Sun these guys and they really took good care of me. Nice to see a company that took time with me (I only bought a Sparc 20) like I was a big spender.