MH> The Ultra 5 IDE controller is a piece of shit. It can't even do UDMA 33,
MH> so you just will not be able to get semi-decent performance out of it,
MH> no matter how good the drive and how small the load is.

...the IDE controller is trash by virtue.  The onboard ATI FB is trash --
the max res you can do 24bpp at is 1152x786 (4mb) .. not that we even have
a working X server.  There are 4 PCI expansion slots, but you can only use
3 because of the bottom right riser is in use by onboard expansion ports.
IIRC, from working with them back at Stargate, u5's came in in a 27x, 33x,
and 399/400 MHz models, where performance differences were minimal.  I
used to think that i386/MHz had a ratio of at least 3:1 to Sparc/MHz, but
not anymore.  The onboard sound isn't bad, but it's not supported.  Happy
meal has autoneg problems.  No USB, no Firewire..and my $600 SunPCI2 card
isn't even detected/supported yet.

All that said, why do we put up with sun hardware?

Reliability
Reliability
Reliability
Reliability
Reliability
Reliability

...that's what it boils down to with Sun, always has.  I know that this U5
will work and boot on it's 15th birthday.  Other than that, it makes a
good area heater.

-lava