Tim Cook <t...@cook.ms> writes: > Kjetil Torgrim Homme <kjeti...@linpro.no> wrote: >> I don't know what the J4500 drive sled contains, but for the J4200 >> and J4400 they need to include quite a bit of circuitry to handle >> SAS protocol all the way, for multipathing and to be able to >> accept a mix of SAS and SATA drives. it's not just a piece of >> sheet metal, some plastic and a LED. >> >> the pricing does look strange, and I think it would be better to >> raise the price of the enclosure (which is silly cheap when empty >> IMHO) and reduce the drive prices somewhat. but that's just >> psychology, and doesn't really matter for total cost. > > Why exactly would that be better?
people are looking at the price list and seeing that the J4200 costs 22550 NOK [1], while one sixpack of 2TB SATA disks to go with it costs 82500 NOK. on the other hand you could get six 2TB SATA disks (Ultrastars) from your friendly neighbourhood shop for 14370 NOK (7700 NOK for six Deskstars). and to add insult to injury, the neighbourhood shop offers five years warranty (required by Norwegian consumer laws), compared to Sun's three years... everyone knows the price of a harddisk since they buy them for their home computers. do they know the price of a disk storage array? not so well. yes, it's a matter of perception for the buyer, but perception can matter. > Then it's a high cost of entry. What if an SMB only needs 6 drives > day one? Why charge them an arm and a leg for the enclosure, and > nothing for the drives? Again, the idea is that you're charging based > on capacity. see my numbers above. the chassis itself is just 12% of the cost (22% when half full). some middle ground could be found. anyway, we're buying these systems and are very happy with them. when disks fail, Sun replace them very expediently and with a minimum of fuss. [1] all prices include VAT to simplify comparison. prices are current from shop.sun.com and komplett.no. Sun list prices are subject to haggling. -- Kjetil T. Homme Redpill Linpro AS - Changing the game _______________________________________________ zfs-discuss mailing list zfs-discuss@opensolaris.org http://mail.opensolaris.org/mailman/listinfo/zfs-discuss
