Re: Sun Blade 100 vs Ultra 60

[Michael Lorenz <macallan%netbsd.org@localhost>]

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Hello,

On Feb 11, 2008, at 03:25, Al - image hosting services wrote:

> On Sun, 10 Feb 2008, Michael Lorenz wrote:
> > > I have been doing some research, though I still don't have any
> > > answers.
> > >
> > > Looking at the Sun Blade 100, it is a small pci based machine. This
> > > would
> > > be great for my purpose. I should be able put in 2 hard drives,
> > > plus if I
> > > pulled the cdrom, floppy drive and card reader I should be able to
> > > put in
> > > 2 more. Does anyone know if the power supply could run this many
> > > drives or
> > > if there is are upgrade options for it? Also, is there a firmware
> > > limit on
> > > the size of a drive that could be put in it?
> >
> > First - the power supply is a bog standard ATX part if I remember
> > correctly so if it's too small you can easily upgrade it. Then, if
> > there is a limit in the firmware that only limits where you can put
> > the loaders and the kernel, it does not keep NetBSD from accessing
> > the whole disk.
>
> So, the powersupply shouldn't be an issue. Is the motherboard standard
> form factor too? Maybe I could put it into another case.

Have a look, I'd almost bet it's pretty close to ATX.

> > > The Ultra 60 looks like a better system and should easily be able
> > > to hold 4 drives, although it would be more exspensive to colo.  
> > > Is there a big
> > > advantagee to having 2 cpus and the larger case? Is there an option
> > > to put the motherboard into a smaller case?
> >
> > We don't currently support SMP on sparc64 and there's not much room
> > in the U60 for IDE drives.
> > It has two dedicated SCA bays, you'd need at least one SCA drive to
> > boot from since there's no onboard IDE and finding an IDE or SATA
> > card with fcode ROM could be difficult.
>
> Is there good support for a SATA card (if I wasn't trying to boot  
> off of
> it)? This could be a good solution to possible performance issues  
> that I
> have now.

Any SATA card otherwise supported by NetBSD should work.

> > The U60 is better in several ways though:
> > - - it can take 2GB RAM
> > - - the CPUs can have up to 4MB cache
> > - - you get four 64bit PCI slots, one 66MHz capable
> > Downsides:
> > - - it will suck more power than a Blade 100
> > - - you need a card to hook up IDE drives ( although you'd probably
> > want one for the Blade as well, the onboard IDE controller isn't that
> > fast IIRC )
>
> This is true in either case. I would want to put in a controller that
> could handle 500 gb drives. I have read that you had to have 5 volt  
> cards
> for the Sun Blade 100. Do you know if this is true?

Probably. The 66MHz slot in the U60 runs at 3.3v though ( and 32bit /  
33MHz cards do work in there as long as they can deal with 3.3v )

> Also, I have been using an ATTO SCSI controller and an intel 100+ pro
> ethernet card in a mac running NetBSD. Both seem to work incredibly
> reliably. Would they work equally as well in a Sun?

Very likely. I don't know what exact kind of ethernet controller the  
Blade has on its mainboard but the U60 has a hme, one of the nicest  
fast ethernet NICs around.

have fun
Michael

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