Speaking from an HPC perspective, it is interesting how the market shifted years ago. I remember when most HPC shops were buy Alphas, SGI's, and Crays with distaste for x86. While those platforms were more expensive, the reality is that they took up less space and complexity. For example, 5 x quad Alphas could easily out perform a few racks of x86 gear hands down. But, it was the low entry price and hype that drew the purchasers of such systems using Linux on x86. It was never a performance difference or capabilities as the software was portable to begin with. So instead of a few racks of gear, you have rows after rows of x86 gear.
And sadly, you see the same thing in the enterprise today with Windows and Linux. Even with VMware, VM sprawl is forcing companies to look at cloud computing to drive down the costs. With all the power and cooling hungry x86 gear eating up the floor space, it certainly makes SPARC and Power fanboys laugh. But unfortunately, it's not the best technology that wins.. it's usually the 80/20 rule of sub-par, sub-standard, technology that wins due to costs, familiarity, and accessibility. At the end of the day, it probably makes sense for Oracle to focus on the mid-range to high-end for SPARC. If Oracle can make Containers, LDoms, and DSDs as easy to manage as VMware.. that could change the game. Making all this great technology more accessible will help grow business. The more specialized it is, the harder it is for organizations to invest in it. *-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-* Octave J. Orgeron Solaris Virtualization Architect and Consultant Web: http://unixconsole.blogspot.com E-Mail: unixcons...@yahoo.com *-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-* ----- Original Message ---- From: Ian Collins <i...@ianshome.com> To: Edward Martinez <mindbende...@live.com>; Open Solaris <opensolaris-discuss@opensolaris.org> Sent: Tue, June 1, 2010 3:18:21 PM Subject: Re: [osol-discuss] SUN not doing well under Oracle. On 06/ 1/10 11:59 PM, Edward Martinez wrote: > I just read AMD opterons and Linux is powering the worlds fastest > supercomputer. If the x86 platform and Linux now has the capacity to > produce this type of results, where does this leave Power and SPARC > platfroms? > http://www.marketwatch.com/story/amd-opterontm-processor-again-dominates-top500-2010-05-31?reflink=MW_news_stmp > The graphics here are interesting: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/10187248.stm -- Ian. _______________________________________________ opensolaris-discuss mailing list opensolaris-discuss@opensolaris.org _______________________________________________ opensolaris-discuss mailing list opensolaris-discuss@opensolaris.org
