[CentOS] [OT] SPARC platforms -- WAS: Hot swap CPU

Bryan J. Smith <b.j.smith@ieee.org> thebs413 at earthlink.net
Thu Jun 30 23:55:07 UTC 2005


From: Peter Arremann <loony at loonybin.org>
> Sun will very willingly support all certified solutions (including EMC, netApp 
> or Hitachi for storage) as well as provide some support with uncertified 
> hardware for us... no issues... 

You work in a Fortune 5, they will do anything you tell them.
I've been there before, and that is a very nice position to hold.

But not when you work for a 50 engineer semiconductor startup.
Sun really pissed us off regularly, so we stuck with Fujistu.

> Yep - but how is that a benefit if your stuff works? NVidia is fabless i.e. 
> and you surely don't want to tell me they aren't good at what they do... 
> Having your own fab or not has very little influence...

I was just saying that anyone who only wants to go to Sun because they
are behind SPARC might consider Fujitsu, who actually fabs the chips.
I've walked into many shops who have had issues with Sun's support and
they never knew about Fujitsu as an option.  That's all.

> Sbus ???? Now you're talking US-I/II again - and that is absolutely
> no match for an opteron box... 

Sorry, I meant NUMA/UPA -- my bad.

> Based on what? The Implementation of Solaris for AMD dates back to SE b68 or 
> 69... that's mid 2004... Compare that to an OS that already ran on the 
> software emulator before silicon was even out there...

Solaris was _also_ running on the x86-64 emulator too.  ;->

AMD and Sun were in negotiations before the first Opteron came out.

> Solaris 10 on AMD64 is definitely less stable that Centos 4 on the same v40z...
> Running the same apps we had 0 crashes with Linux vs. 2 explained and
> patched, 1 explained still unpatched and 1 unexplained crash on Solaris10... 

I meant the design:
  "given its experience on partial mesh interconnected systems"

I thought by putting that in the _same_statement_ you'd see what I meant by
"mature."  Sorry, I assumed wrong.  ;->

> Why would you need to run on sparc to produce a stable OS for an opteron box?

Re-read my full statement ...

  'Solaris is probably the most "mature" OS for Opteron 200/800 right now,
   given its experience on partial mesh interconnected systems.'



--
Bryan J. Smith   mailto:b.j.smith at ieee.org




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