Sun Upgrades Entry-level Server Line At SunNetwork Conference

Among the new offerings is the V440 server, an entry-level version of its v480 four-way rackmount server; the V250 entry-level tower server; and the Sun Blade 1500, the latest version of its technical workstations.

The V440 can be configured for up to four UltraSPARC 3i processors with either 1.06GHz or 1.28GHz speed, said Soheil Saliba, vice president of marketing for Sun's volume system products. Memory is scalable to up to 16 Gbytes, while the server can have up to four hot-swap hard drives, he said.

Most importantly, is the fact that the V440 starts at $9,995, for a configuration with two 1.06GHz processors, 4 Gbytes of memory and four 26-Gbyte Ultra320 SCSI hard drives, Saliba said. In comparison, a Dell model 6650 costs 40 percent to 50 percent higher, he said.

The V480, which Sun is still producing, starts at about twice the price of the V440 but can be configured for twice the memory, eight times the Level-2 cache, and a higher bus speed than the V440, Saliba said.

The V250 is Sun's first new tower server in some time, Saliba said. "We've recently focused on rack-optimized servers," he said. "We left off follow-ups to our tower servers. Partners are pushing us on this."

The new servers, aimed at department workgroups and remote offices, can be configured with one or two UltraSPARC 3i processors with either 1.06GHz or 1.28GHz speed, as well as up to eight hard drives, or about a half-terabyte of storage, Saliba said.

The V250 can also be configured with up to six PCI co-processor cards, which are full Windows or Linux servers in blade form. The cards are based on Advanced Mico Devices' Athlon XP 1600 processor. This makes the V250 the only server to be able to run Solaris, Windows, and Linux applications natively, Saliba said.

Starting price for the V250 with one processor, a 36-Gbyte hard drive and 512 Mbytes of memory, is $2,999, Saliba said. That includes Solaris PC NetLink 2.0, Sun ONE Calendar Server, Sun ONE Grid Engine, Sun ONE Application Server and Directory Server and more, he said. That price also includes pre-installation of up to 25 Star Office licenses, he said.

Sun has also officially unveiled its Sun Blade 1500 technical workstations with the UltraSPARC 3i processor at 1.06GHz. It supports up to 4 Gbytes of RAM and up to two 80-Gbyte ATA-100 hard drives. The company hopes it and its channel partners can use the new workstation to sell upgrades to the current installed base, which Saliba said exceeds 500,000 units across the different vendors.

In addition to solution providers, the company's entry-level servers also go through such companies as CDW and Insightv Saliba said. However, Sun helps its solution providers compete against such suppliers with programs including vertical focus on certain markets like retail banking, he said. "If you look at raw box vs. raw box, solution providers will struggle," he said. "You've got to differentiate."