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eWeek Labs Examines Sun Ultra 40 Workstation Deemed Excellent for Performance Intensive Applications April 17, 2006, Volume 98, Issue 3
Sun introduced its Sun UltraTM 40 Workstation in February to replace its Sun JavaTM Workstation W2100z. It caught the eye of eWeek Labs, which ran its own set of testing and found the 64-bit AMD Opteron-based workstation an excellent candidate in its interoperability and performance as well as a good performer in manageability, expandability and power efficiency, according to Anne Chen's eWeek article. Preloaded with the SolarisTM 10 Operating System (Solaris OS), Sun JavaTM Studio Creator, Sun JavaTM Studio Enterprise, the NetBeansTM Integrated Development Environment (IDE) and SunTM Studio, eWeek Labs appreciated the workstation's application support, graphics technology and its ability to take full advantage of the 64-bit Opteron processors. With the purchase of this workstation, customers also receive a free license for Sun N1TM Grid Engine software, allowing IT managers to leverage unused compute cycles in their grid environments. The Sun system supports 32- and 64-bit versions of Microsoft's Windows XP Professional, as well as 32- and 64-bit versions of Red Hat's Red Hat Enterprise Linux WS and Novell's SUSE Linux Enterprise Server. Supporting one or two AMD Opteron 200 Series single-core CPUs, which range from 2.0 GHz (model 246) to 2.8 GHz (model 254), this Sun workstation also can support AMD's dual-core 2.2 GHz Opteron 275 and 2.4 GHz Opteron 280 processors. Each Opteron CPU has three 8 GB-per-second HyperTransport interconnects, Chen explains. In addition, the workstation supports up to 16 GB of RAM and Nvidia's nForce Professional 2200 and 2050 graphics processors. It also features two PCI Express x16 graphics interface slots and two PCI Express x4 slots, and can support as many as four SATA drives at 80 GB, 250 GB or 500 GB each, according to Chen. The workstation also has 2 TB maximum RAID 0 and RAID 1 support. The Ultra 40 Workstation eWeek Labs tested came equipped with two dual-core 2.4 GHz Opteron 280 processors, 8 GB of DDR400 memory, a 250 GB SATA drive and an Nvidia Quadro FX 3450 PCI Express graphics card for a list price of US$6,995. Chen reports that the workstation ran quietly despite its power and is ideal for performance-intensive applications, grid computing and software development. In regards to price, Chen stated that the Ultra 40 workstation is competitive to other 64-bit workstations eWeek Labs reviewed, from vendors including Dell and Hewlett-Packard. "An entry-level Ultra 40 with a 200 Series single-core Opteron processor, 1 GB of memory, an 80 GB SATA hard drive and an Nvidia Quadro graphics accelerator graphics card costs $2,295," Chen writes. "The Ultra 40 is priced competitively with workstations from Dell and HP, although it will cost significantly more than the $2,295 entry-level price to beef it up."
Chen also noted that Sun's recent acquisition of Aduva [16158] will make it easy for organizations with multiple workstations, such as the Ultra 40, to reduce risk by automating tasks such as patch and operating system updates. With Aduva's technology, Sun will be able to more effectively help enterprises automate the processes associated with patch and dependency management, easing the burden on system administrators. Sun anticipates, with the integration of Aduva technology, it will be able to deliver active dependency patch and update services for Solaris OS and Linux servers with a solution that scales from individual servers, up to large scale data centers with tens of thousands of machines in complex networks.
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The Ultra 40 is priced competitively with workstations from Dell and HP... 
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eWeek Labs Examines Sun Ultra 40 Workstation
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